This week, Bentley offered a glimpse of its future.
The England-based Volkswagen subsidiary placed second in the Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains using a proprietary blend of biofuel. The car took the top prize for alternative-fuel vehicles, outpacing the Tesla Plaid, among others.
Bentley plans to use the impressive finish to propel a loftier goal: becoming carbon neutral by 2030.
The luxury carmaker is scheduled to roll out hybrid editions of all its models by 2023, its first consumer electric model by 2025, and electric versions of all models by 2030.
Though Bentley will exit the GT3 series, it plans to stay involved in racing, with an eye toward clean-energy contests such as Formula E and Extreme E.
Seemingly every luxury carmaker is making an electric shift.
- Lamborghini is spending $1.8 billion to develop hybrid and electric cars.
- McLaren will stop developing petrol engines by 2030 and enters Formula E next year.
- Ferrari plans to offer electric cars by 2025.
Bentley said its sales are up around 30% over 2020, which was already a record year for the company. Bugatti, Lamborghini, and Porsche also had record sales in 2020, with Porsche bringing in $34 billion in revenue.
