GM Again Temporarily Halts Volt Production Over Low Sales

In the same week that the Obama administration announced its new fuel economy standard, U.S. automaker General Motors announced it would halt production of the Chevrolet Volt electric car for four weeks, citing the car’s failure to meet targeted sales projections, according to Bloomberg news.

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GM sold 10,666 Volts in the U.S. in July. Global sales were targeted at 60,000 units, with 45,000 on the U.S. market. Sales for 2011 were also under target, and even though an investigation into vehicle safety concluded that the Volt did not pose a fire risk, the congressional hearings on the issue led to a slow-down in sales.

According to Bloomberg, citing Automotive News, GM will halt production at the Detroit-Hamtramck assembly plant between 17 September and 15 October, though GM did not independently confirm those dates.

“In the past couple of months, the production of the Volt was running ahead of sales, but I thought that might be for this particular process because they’re bringing in the new vehicle, so they were intentionally trying to get ahead,” Alan Baum, principal of Baum & Associates, told Bloomberg.

This is not the first time GM has stopped Volt production because of weak sales: The automaker also did so earlier this year, just before the model was named European Car of the Year.

— Charles Kennedy

This post is based on one from OilPrice.com and was republished with permission.