Volvo Cars said on Tuesday (Sep 19) that it will end production of any remaining diesel models by early 2024 as it heads towards becoming an all-electric carmaker.

“In a few months from now, the last diesel-powered Volvo car will have been built, making Volvo Cars one of the first legacy car makers to take this step,” the Swedish company said in a statement.

Majority owned by China’s Geely, Volvo has committed to going fully electric by 2030.

While a majority of the cars Volvo sold in Europe were diesel as recently as 2019, in 2022 they made up just 8.9 per cent of the Swedish carmaker’s sales.

In August 33 per cent of Volvo’s sales were fully-electric or hybrid models. The company did not break out how many of the remaining 67 per cent combustion-engine models were diesel and how many ran on petrol.

Sales of diesel models have declined rapidly in Europe since Volkswagen’s emission-cheating scandal and carmakers have been gradually reducing the number of diesel models available in their model lineups.

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Diesel vehicles comprised more than 50 per cent of Europe’s new car sales in 2015, but accounted for just over 14 per cent of sales in July. REUTERS