ZEV mandate review: who wants what

The ZEV mandate has been reviewed, defended, attacked and reviewed again since we launched in July. Positions have been stated by manufacturers, charge point operators, the government's own climate advisers and the trade bodies representing everyone in between. Almost none of it has been set out in one place.

This page is that place. We will update it as positions change.

The positions

Every row links to the THRIVE story and, through it, to the primary source. New positions are added as rows; we do not republish the page.

What the argument is actually about

It is easy to read this as manufacturers wanting to sell more petrol cars and environmental bodies wanting to stop them. That is not quite it.

The mandate sets the share of a manufacturer's sales that must be zero-emission, with penalties for missing it. The industry's objection, as the SMMT has framed it, is not to the destination but to the mechanism: the targets bind the supply side while nothing binds the demand side. A manufacturer can build the cars and cannot make people buy them, and the flexibilities that let them manage the gap are finite.

The CCC's counter, in its progress report, is that the trajectory is what makes the whole thing work. Concede the interim targets and you concede 2030, and the fallback is imported oil. ChargeUK's interest is more direct still - the business case for building charge points is a bet on the number of electric vehicles that will exist to use them, and that number is the mandate.

Both readings are internally consistent. That is why it has not resolved.

Where the data sits

Two figures from our own coverage are worth holding alongside the rhetoric.

Zero-emission cars reached 23 per cent of new UK car registrations, up from 19 per cent a year earlier. That is real movement, and it is the number both sides cite - as evidence the mandate is working, or as evidence the market is getting there without needing penalties.

Separately, we reported in issue 2 that Britain may miss its 2030 Clean Power target. The charging and generation side of the transition is not obviously on track either, which complicates the argument that vehicle supply is the binding constraint.

What fleets should actually do

Here is the part that gets lost. For a fleet operator, the outcome of this review changes very little about the correct decision this year, and it is worth being clear about why.

Your BIK position is not in scope. Zero-emission company cars sit at 4 per cent for 2026/27. That is set by the Treasury, not by the mandate, and nothing in this review touches it. The salary sacrifice case stands regardless.

Your running costs are not in scope. Our Fleet Cost Index has diesel at 2.5 times the per-mile fuel cost of electric and rising. That gap is driven by pump prices and HMRC rates, not by manufacturer sales quotas.

Supply might be in scope. This is the real exposure. If the targets are relaxed, some manufacturers will slow electric model rollout and discounting at the affordable end, because the mandate is currently what forces them to move metal there. The sub-£25,000 electric segment we have been tracking all summer exists partly because it has to. A weaker mandate could mean fewer cheap electric cars, later, at worse prices.

Your residual values might be in scope. If the 2030 position softens, demand for used electric vehicles in 2029 looks different. Nobody can price that today, but it belongs in the risk register rather than being ignored.

So: proceed with the electrification decisions the arithmetic already supports, and treat the review as a supply and residual risk rather than a policy signal to wait on. Waiting has a cost of its own, and at 2.5 times per mile, that cost is now measurable.

What would change this page

A published outcome to the review. Any change to the interim targets or the flexibility mechanisms. A manufacturer publicly revising its UK electric rollout. Any of those and we will update, and note the date we did.