Honda Motor has announced to invest 5 trillion yen ($40 billion) to develop its electric vehicles (EVs) technology over the next decade.
“We aim to realize carbon neutrality for all products and activities Honda is involved in by 2050, striving to eliminate carbon emissions from power sources of a wide variety of products,” Tokyo-based Honda said in a statement. “To this end, Honda believes that a multi-faceted and multi-dimensional approach is needed, not a mere replacing of engines with batteries.”
“By allocating the proceeds from these green bonds to the development and production of zero-emission vehicles, Honda will further accelerate our initiatives toward the realization of a society that aims for zero environmental impact,” the company said.
Honda’s budget to develop EV technology is part of the group’s wider 8 trillion-yen budget for research and development as the company streamlines existing businesses to reduce overall automobile production costs by 10% from 2018 levels while gearing up for new growth areas such as EVs.
Honda aims to produce more than 2 million environment-friendly EV cars annually from 2030 with the launch of 30 EVs and its models by then.
Honda claims to be the world’s largest manufacturer of power units, with yearly sales of 30 million units of mobility products used in motorcycles, automobiles, outboard motors and aircraft.
Honda’s transition to environment-friendly vehicles will partly be funded by the $2.75 billion green bonds the company issued last month.