General Motors and Stellantis paid a combined $363.8 million in fines for failing to meet federal fuel economy standards for cars and trucks they made in previous years, according to federal government documents released Friday.
GM paid $128.2 million for failing to meet targets for the light trucks it sold in 2018 and 2019, according to documents posted on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s website. Stellantis, the company created by Fiat Chrysler’s merger with French automaker Peugeot, paid $235.6 million for cars it sold in 2016 and 2017.
GM paid the fine in December, documents showed, and Stellantis made payments in December and May. Reuters previously reported on the payments.
The fines date back to years before each company began producing electric and hybrid vehicles in significant numbers. The fines were imposed based on average fuel consumption standards overseen by the safety agency.
Fuel economy standards date back to before electric vehicles and hybrid cars were widely available. For many years, car manufacturers routinely paid fines for failing to meet regulatory targets. But the penalties were typically much lower than the amounts recently paid by GM and Stellantis.
In recent years, GM, Stellantis and other automakers have avoided paying fines by buying fuel economy credits from manufacturers that made electric or other zero-emissions vehicles. GM covered its 2016 and 2017 fines with credits, but decided to pay the fines in 2022, federal documents said.
GM and Stellantis, along with most other automakers, are rushing to launch new electric models and expect most of the vehicles they sell to be electric within a decade.
Stellantis said it will invest $35 billion in the development of battery-powered vehicles and related software and plans to offer 25 electric models in the United States by 2030. The fines it paid reflect “past performance recorded prior to the creation of Stellantis and are not indicative of the company’s direction,” the company said in a statement.
GM has said it hopes to produce a million electric vehicles a year by 2025 and to phase out combustion engine vehicles by 2035.