VW Outlines E-Mobility Plan, Electric Golf in the Works

In the eve of the Geneva Auto Show, where the Volkswagen group will field a line-up of hybrids and EVs unlike anything it ever assembled, the company's chairman of the board, Martin Winterkorn, stepped up and announced what we'll see in Geneva is only the beginning.

According to Winterkorn, what are today concepts will turn production version starting 2011. But not necessarily as the cars and concepts we already know. First, will have an electric Golf, shaped as a testing fleet 500 units strong, in 2011. Then, a hybrid version of the Jetta will hit the US in 2012. The following year, E-Up is up for production.

The goal of this ambitious project is simple: become the market leader in E-mobility by the year 2018 as Winterkorn asys.

"We want to attain an electric vehicle market share of three percent within our entire range of products. We will take the hybrid out of its niche status with our high-volume models. In the future, the heart of the brand will also beat with electricity."

But that's not all. Sooner than we might think (or like to think), VW will turn more and more hybrid/EV. The Jetta Hybrid will debut in August 2012, the Passat Hybrid in August 2013 and two months later the Golf Hybrid. In later years, "a modular E-traction approach will systematically extend electrification to other model series," says VW.

"We will continue to systematically exploit the potential of internal combustion engines with the goal of significantly reducing fuel consumption and emissions. So over the mid-term, vehicles with electric drives and those with internal combustion engines will co-exist."