Lexus banks on hybrids despite looming 2030 ICE ban

Lexus's hybrid cars are still "relevant", despite the looming ban on sales of new petrol and diesel cars, Lexus Europe boss Dimitris Tripospitis has told Autocar.

The UK government will ban sales of new cars without a "significant zero-emissions capability" from 2030, although it's yet to define what this means for manufacturers.

In the meantime, it will introduce a sales mandate for zero-emissions vehicles, requiring 22% of a maker’s deliveries to be ZEVs from next year and ramping up thereafter.

Discussing the launch of the new Lexus LBX hybrid, deliveries of which are set to begin in the first quarter of 2024, Tripospitis said he was unworried by the potentially short shelf life of the crossover.

He said: “You can imagine we've done a lot of clinics, as everybody [does], I guess. It was very obvious that for the next few years, the majority of the European market is still not moving to EVs. Which means that if you look at the continent, it's a relevant technology to have the hybrid for the car.

"For the UK market in specific, of course, we need to study the mandate. Things are moving very fast. 

“For the next few years, I believe the technology is relevant, because it has all the benefits. The ‘self-charging’ hybrid [in its] fifth generation has a lot of technology benefits."

Autocar recently reported that Lexus parent company Toyota believes that its parallel-hybrid powertrains perform enough zero-emissions running to qualify as significant-zero-emission vehicles.

Toyota UK manufacturing boss Richard Kenworthy said: “What we can demonstrate is that 80% of the time and 50% of the distance is zero-emissions for hybrids in urban environments.”

Kenworthy added that “we believe hybrid is part of the solution that allows us to get carbon down as quickly as possible”.