Performance petrol set to land in hostile territory as country ramps up for more change in environmental considerations.

POTENTIAL the impending new version of Ford’s big hitter ute, the Raptor, could be stand to be whacked by Government’s new emissions rules due to shift to a high-performance petrol engine is being taken on the chin by the national distributor.

Specific economy and exhaust emission figures for the 3.0-litre twin turbo V6 that is coming to the performance truck later this year has yet to be shared.

 Yet the model’s development team and data from the United States where the engine is sourced and already places in some products suggests it is thirstier and has somewhat higher emissions than the biturbo diesel the current Raptor runs.

That signals it could well achieve a status that could, ultimately, hit Ford New Zealand and the model’s buyers in the pocket, to the tune of thousands of dollars as emissions penalties begin to bite.

The brand today acknowledged Raptor might ultimately fall particularly foul of Government’s Clean Car Standard, which effectively kicks off with the ute tax on April 1.

However it also says the derivative was also set to be such a niche seller that, overall, it would be unlikely to worsen the brand’s CO2 average, which is in any event set to improve this year with arrival of hybrid engines in its passenger cars and the electric Transit van.

Raptor was last year the lowest performing doublecab Ranger for sales, accounting for just 441 of the 12539 registrations the market-dominating model achieved; a 3.5 percent share. By comparison, the Wildtrak claimed 3538 units, for a 28 percent share.

Clancy said he could not offer prediction of what sort of volume the V6 petrol might achieve, but said Ford NZ expected it to achieve a rate akin to the current one, perhaps even less given that cost of fuel has climbed and there is more interest in emissions currently.

“We don’t see this impacting the overall fleet average because it is such a highly specialist vehicle.

“… the people who want it, will want it, because it is a high-performance off-road vehicle, a one of a kind thing.

“But I don’t think the numbers it will do will make a material impact on the average.”

Even so, individual buyers will be aware that all one-tonne utilities sold new from April 1 are set to be hit by the ‘ute tax’, a new environment in which vehicles that emit more than 192 grams of CO2 per kilometre will be penalised.  

The greater the CO2 count over the cut-off, the higher the penalty, though it ultimately caps at just under $6000.

That’s just round one of the Government’s push to clean up vehicle emissions – more financial impact will follow in time.

Ford asserts the current model’s 2.0-litre four-cylinder offers optimal economy of 8.2 litres per 100km and is cited as expressing 212 grams per kilometre of CO2.  

That makes it the most efficient and cleanest engine in the current Ranger, well ahead of the 3.2-litre five cylinder which won’t carry into the new family. Though dropped from Raptor, the 2.0-litre will continue in the new Ranger and Everest. 

Clancy says Ford NZ’s intent is to push ever more customers toward the 2.0-litre. This despite Ford also being set to have a new 3.0-litre biturbo diesel V6 in at least one version of the new range, coming in June.

Overseas’ data suggests the new petrol V6, which might show within a couple of months of the mainstream models’ arrival, might average 11.8 litres per 100km and express around 277g/km.

Those are figures associated with the Explorer ST, which runs this powerplant in a slightly higher state of tune.

The Ranger Raptor unit is cited to be the same as one in another North America-restricted model, the Bronco Raptor. Economy and emissions data for that model are also still undisclosed; however power and torque outputs appear to be very close to the Explorer’s.

Ford NZ cites belief its whole of fleet CO2 average will be just 128 grams per kilometre. Yet the light commercial CO2 average when taken in isolation was high in 2021, being 235g/km. That’s 53g/km above the national new car fleet average.

The latter, in turn, is well above the 139g/km target Government is encouraging the new vehicle industry to meet from 2023. This is set to drop to 105g/km in 2025. 

There’s more than embarrassment at stake for brands to meet those averages.

This is the first year of the Clean Car Standard and is serving as an education and familiarisation period for market involvers.

However, distributors are obliged to start meeting targets from January 1 next year, and those that fail can expect to be penalised on a per-vehicle scale.

When Government announced this last year, it gave as an example what would happen if, from 2025, a distributor imported new cars with average emissions of 171g/km (which was the average for all passenger cars on the road last year)

That distributor would need to pay a penalty of $4950 per vehicle.

Clancy asserted Ford is, overall, heading to a cleaner future and asserted all models, Ranger included, will ultimately produce less CO2.

“Ford has the same ambition as Government when it comes to reducing CO2. 

“If you look at the entire Ford fleet, that’s drastically reducing .. this year we have all sorts of hybrid coming in, we have the (fully electric) e-Transit … all of our Focus models except the ST are some sort of hybrid.

“Overall, we will continue to decrease average emissions.”