A fully electric Renault 5: currently the most popular small electric car in Europe.Image: Watson
The pressure from the industry became too great: even after 2035, cars with combustion engines will be allowed to come onto the market in Europe. This has a direct impact on Switzerland.
December 17, 2025, 09:14December 17, 2025, 09:20
Remo Hess, Brussels / ch media
So now: The EU is backing down and overturning the planned ban on internal combustion engines. The EU Commission announced this on Tuesday. In practice, this means that new cars with gasoline or diesel engines will be allowed to be registered in Europe even after 2035. Under the old legislation, this would have been effectively forbidden.
This U-turn has direct consequences for Switzerland – although neither the original EU ban on combustion engines nor the move now decided has any legal application in this country. The reason is simple and shows exemplarily how EU rules also radiate into Switzerland, even if they are not adopted here.
Nobody produces combustion engines specifically for Switzerland
The Swiss automobile market is simply too small for a special solution for the large car manufacturers to be worthwhile. When it comes to pollutant emissions, these are based on the EU specifications, even if Switzerland decides on its own approval regulations.
This is also confirmed by Dino Graf from Amag, the largest Swiss car importer: “Nobody will produce combustion engines for Switzerland if the rest of Europe switches to electric.” Switzerland has long been an integral part of Europe when it comes to cars.
However, Amag welcomes the move away from combustion engines in Brussels. People have always advocated openness to technology. This gives more flexibility for everyone involved.
The electric car is still catching on
At the same time, Graf emphasizes that this is not a real turnaround, but rather an adjustment by Europeans on the path to electromobility they have long taken: “The long-term goal remains the same: 100 percent reduction in greenhouse gases – there is no way around electric drives.” Switzerland also follows the same approach with its climate laws.
In fact, it’s worth taking a closer look at the details of the combustion engine shutdown. The EU is not making a tabula rasa and is not allowing the combustion engine to make an unrestricted comeback. Rather, the reduction target for CO₂ emissions is still being drastically reduced. The target refers to the CO emissions that car manufacturers can achieve across their entire fleet from 2035. From the original 100 percent CO₂ reduction – which would have effectively amounted to a ban on combustion engines – the target has now fallen to 90 percent.
Especially good for plugin hybrids and range aids
This means: All new cars from a manufacturer taken together may still emit 10 percent of the CO₂ that the same manufacturer emitted in 2021. However, this ten percent must be compensated for elsewhere, for example, cars must be built with climate-friendly steel or the compensation must be achieved with climate-neutral fuels such as synthetic gasoline or biofuel.
It is important to emphasize that from 2035 onwards, not every tenth new car will automatically be a combustion engine. Again: It’s about reducing CO₂ across the entire fleet.
For example, if manufacturers rely on hybrid vehicles that have both electric and combustion engines and emit significantly less CO₂ than pure combustion engines, they can also bring more than ten percent of such vehicles onto the market. These plug-in hybrids or electric cars with range aids (so-called “range extenders”) can be a good interim solution to purely electric cars.
They decide for themselves how the manufacturers design their mix. The sports car manufacturer Porsche should be happy that it can continue to sell the 911 in the petrol version in the future.
Other manufacturers have already largely completed their production on electric cars aligned. In Germany, the car country, sales are up again after a slump last year clearly dressed. Various German car manufacturers have 2025 new electric models brought onto the market. In Switzerland, too, the electrical business is doing better again, as Dino Graf from Amag confirms. He expects another boost in 2026, when more Electric cars for under 25,000 francs come into offer. (bzbasel.ch)