Last year was challenging for many reasons, but 2021 wasn't entirely bad. Despite the pandemic and the chip shortage, it was a great year for new battery electric vehicles. So much so that more than half of our top 10 drives of the year were BEVs. That's good for consumers looking for a new car—assuming they can find one in stock.
End-of-year top 10 lists are extremely subjective, and no one should read too much into them. But if you want proof of the impending extinction of the internal combustion engine, consider this: On December 23, Hyundai Motor Group (parent company of Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis) shuttered its internal combustion engine research and development division, according to The Korea Economic Daily.
Park Chung-kook, the new head of Hyundai's R&D efforts, explained in an email to Hyundai Motor Group employees that "our own engine development is a great achievement, but we must change the system to create future innovation based on the great asset from the past."
Instead of developing new gasoline- or diesel-powered engines, the researchers and engineers will work on electric powertrains—an area where Hyundai is already extremely competitive.
Previously, Volvo announced that it would also end its internal combustion engine development, but the company appears to be having its cake while still eating it. In 2021, it spun off its entire engine operation—including future R&D and production—to a new joint venture with its parent company, Geely.
I'm not the only one who sees the writing on the wall. Bloomberg envisions a potential crash in the residual value of more expensive gasoline cars, warning that, "while there might still be a robust market for used Honda Accords in 2028, it will probably be a more tenuous market for used gasoline-powered $40,000 sedans and sport utility vehicles as people in that segment switch over to EVs."
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