Another day, another step forward in the field of all-electric vehicles. Car brand MINI has recently made some big announcements, most notable being that it will stop producing combustion-engine cars and stick to EV models instead.
That seems quite ambitious even by global standards. For MINI, a British car brand owned by BMW, all-electric versions of their models only accounts for about 6% of their total sales. Even hybrid vehicles stand at about 11%, much larger than the portion of EV sales.
The Final Combustion-Engine MINI
According to some sources, the last internal combustion-engine model by MINI will come out of their factory gates in the early part of 2025, which is a few more years away. For the time being, however, there is no indication about what that model might look like. Buyers can probably expect a fair bit of innovation when the time comes, seeing how there are still several years until that model rolls off the production line.
Beyond that point in the carmaker’s future, and by the early 2030s, MINI will proceed as a car brand that produces EVs exclusively.
MINI’s Current EV Lineup
Even today, MINI is no stranger to all-electric vehicles and has so far released one EV of its own. The two-door MINI Electric, also known as the Mini Cooper SE, made its debut in Australia and the rest of the world not too long ago in 2020.
Care to guess where the Mini Electric’s drivetrain came from? Well, it was initially developed by none other than its parent company BMW, using the same technology previously used for the BMW i3.
The Bigger Picture for MINI and BMW
MINI’s decision appears to be part of a much larger movement for the group as a whole. It seems that even parent company BMW is moving away from petrol-powered cars much sooner than anticipated. A perfect example is BMW’s i4 model, an EV whose production has been brought forward by about three months.
For Aussies, the i4 will probably land on our shores by early 2022, a few months after it goes into production in Germany in the final quarter of this year.
The i4 isn’t the first all-electric vehicle that BMW will send our way. Before that model comes out, 2021 will see the release of two other EVs like the iX3 and iX, both of which come as electric SUVs.
The carmaker’s executives estimate that by 2030, at least half of the BMW Group’s total sales will consist of electric vehicles.
Is Australia Ready to Go All-Electric?
With industry leaders like British car brand MINI and German parent company BMW declaring their push to go all-electric, Aussie car buyers who want to ditch their petrol-powered cars need to ask one critical question. Is Australia ready to go all-electric?
Well, there’s reason to be optimistic about the future, as both the demand and supply in Australia has seen incredible growth in recent years.
Since 2018, the country has seen an increase in the number of electric car charging stations all across the country. On top of that, according to Infrastructure Australia, sales of EV cars in the country grew by 200% in 2019 alone.
Both the EV infrastructure and demand in Australia are growing, and leading car brands continue to provide more options for buyers by producing their newer models as all-electric vehicles. With this environment, we can already see that Australia will transition away from petrol-powered cars quite smoothly.
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By Ray Hasbollah