GWM Australia says its hybrid-heavy lineup has allowed it to start accumulating credits under the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard (NVES) – meaning it won’t be forced to raise prices for Australian customers.
Under the NVES, which came into effect on January 1, 2025, automakers face fines for exceeding set carbon-dioxide emissions targets.
Fines have been enforced from July 1, 2025, and some car brands have already increased prices. That includes Ford, which on the same day upped the cost of its best-selling Ford Ranger, Everest and Mustang.
On the flip side, automakers can also gain credits for beating the targets, which can be accumulated or sold to other car companies who need to offset their total emissions figures.
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“We’re already building up credits,” said GWM Australia marketing and communications boss Steve MacIver.
“When you consider we’ve already got five hybrids in the lineup, there will be four plug-in hybrids [PHEVs] by the end of this year – we’ve obviously got [GWM] Ora as an EV [electric vehicle] and we’ll see more [EVs] next year.”
In Australia, the automaker offers its Cannon Alpha dual-cab ute and Haval H6 GT with PHEV powertrains, with the Tank 500 PHEV due here by the end of 2025. It also offers hybrid versions of the Tank 500 and smaller Tank 300, as well as the Haval H6 and Haval Jolion SUVs.
Two more EVs are also set to join the lineup by late next year.
“Throw all of them into the mix [and we’ve got] a whole load of products that will give us credits. We’ve got options in front of this, which is, I think that it’s a challenge, but it’s an opportunity for us as well,” said Mr Maciver.
Credits earned under NVES will be calculated on how much a car manufacturer has exceeded emissions targets.
The boss of electric car brand Polestar, Scott Maynard, recently told CarExpert he didn’t expect the credits to be of significant financial value.
Similarly, GWM Australia is not looking to NVES credits as a revenue stream.
It is, however, looking to its 50,000 sales target for this year with a view to become a top five brand in Australia by 2030.
“We don’t want to build up credits to sell them, we want to maximise our volume any way we can,” said GWM chief operating officer John Kett.
“Fundamentally, the NVES compliance would be on the margin, so you can maximise and extend the price points of your vehicles to consumers.”
Mt Kett suggested the current sales split between hybrid, plug-in hybrid and petrol GWM models may see more credits as hybrid popularity grows – also enabling diesel models in the brand’s local lineup, which will in turn reduce credits as the company gets closer to emissions limits.
Among its upcoming powertrains is a 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 hybrid powertrain which it says will better a similar set-up in the Ferrari SF90, while it has also confirmed it’s working on a bigger, beefier diesel engine for its off-roaders.
“[It’s] the reason we like to say we want to be on the leading edge of adoption with our technology, not on the cutting edge of a newsworthy story – we’ve got to be commercial,” said Mr Kett.
“So we’ll cut that line as fine as we can – and I have no doubt there are months – this is the first month, really, but we’ve been practicing with it, thinking we’re a bit off.
“But we’re not off enough to drive a price rise, and we’re not off enough to go and say, ‘Let’s go sell some credits’.
“We’re just sitting on the margins, and that’s where we’ll sit. We think it’s the best way to grow volume. This time next year, we’ll get there, and we’ll see how we really go – it really counts by that time.”
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