France's environment minister Nicolas Hulot just announced an ambitious goal aimed at curbing climate change: Stopping the sale of all gasoline-or-diesel-powered cars by 2040.
On Thursday, Hulot -- a former nature documentary narrator in the vein of David Attenborough -- announced the government's plan, which still must go through several steps before it is enacted.
"We are announcing an end to the sale of petrol and diesel cars by 2040," Hulot said during the speech, according to France24.
The minister also announced plans to increase the government's investment in green and sustainable technologies in the coming years, France24 added.
Other countries like Germany are also hoping to scale down the use of gasoline-powered vehicles. Hulot's announcement comes just after Volvo unveiled its plan to end the production of cars that run only on combustion engines, starting in 2019.
Hulot's plan to phase out sales of these cars isn't a done-deal, however. Thursday's event marked the rollout of the new government's clean energy agenda, but it still needs to be approved by the French Parliament before it can go into effect.
France's ambitious goals are part of an effort to meet the country's commitments to the Paris Climate Agreement, which went into force in 2016. That international agreement aims to limit human-caused global warming to "well below" 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, above pre-industrial average through 2100.
Increasing the use of electric vehicles worldwide could go a long way toward meeting that goal.
A study published in June suggests that electric vehicles need to make up about 15 percent of new global car sales as part of a plan to avoid the worst effects of global climate change, such as sea level rise and deadly heat waves. At the moment, electric vehicle car sales account for 1 percent of global car sales.
Steven Jambot contributed to this report.
Topics Electric Vehicles
