Citroen will abandon the internal combustion engine in Europe by 2030, the timing of the appearance of the nearest new products

The French brand Citroen, which is part of the Stellantis Corporation, is preparing for a complete “greening” of its key European market, but the next mass-market innovations will continue to be offered with internal combustion engines.

Last summer, Stellantis management announced a global electrification course, in which the European brands that are part of the corporation will become “green”. So the new brands Abarth, DS and Lancia after 2024 will be only electric, Alfa Romeo and Fiat will completely switch to electric vehicles in 2027, Opel in 2028, Peugeot in 2030 the refusal of internal combustion engines in Europe, but recently announced this date French newspaper L'argus – 2030.

European Citroen C3 after restyling in 2020.

The newspaper also contains other interesting insider information. The fourth-generation European Citroen C3 will debut in the fall of 2023. The “third” C3, developed on the old PF1 platform, has been produced since 2016 and is now the brand's most popular model: last year, according to CarSalesBase, 156,904 units were sold in Europe. — 11th in the overall model ranking and 6th in class B, led by Renault Clio in 2021 (199,889 units sold).

New cross-hatchback Citroen C3 for the Indian market.

The new C3 will be based on a modified CMP modular platform already received by the Citroën C3 cross-hatchback for emerging markets. The “European” will also become a cross-hatchback, but its equipment and trim will be richer than those of the namesake for India and Latin America, and the design will certainly have its own characteristics. The power plant will be key to the new European C3, but there will also be internal combustion versions, as they are still significantly cheaper than electric ones and put the French marque at the top of the box office.

In 2024, a related second-generation Citroen C3 Aircross subcompact crossover will appear, also on the CMP platform and also with a wide variety of power plants. With the change of generations, the assembly of SUVs will move from the Spanish Zaragoza to the Slovak Trnava, where the current C3 hatchback is produced.

Citroen C5 Aircross after facelift in 2022.

The change of generations of the Citroën C5 Aircross compact crossover is scheduled for 2025. The new C5 Aircross will receive the STLA Medium modular platform, designed primarily for electric vehicles (the cruising range on a single charge is up to 700 km), but, according to French colleagues, the crossover will also have versions with internal combustion engines, even as part of a plug-in hybrid power plant. There are no other details yet.

In January, it was reported that Stellantis was preparing some kind of budget model for late, most likely an adapted version of the C3 cross-hatchback for emerging markets, but now, in light of the sanctions and geopolitical turmoil, it is unclear whether these plans will be executed.