Thank you very much.
Good morning, everyone. Thank you for having me.
I'll start by saying the auto industry is past the inflection point of change when it comes to electrification, having invested to date over $300 billion in zero-emission vehicle development and production, which is already resulting in a substantial supply, with much more to come. You could confidently say that our industry is at the point of no return when it comes down to zero-emission vehicles in the future.
I'm proud that Hyundai is an industry leader. We presently are the second-largest retailer of zero-emission vehicles, next to Tesla, and one of the only brands to offer hydrogen fuel cell cars in Canada.
While we offer hybrids and plug-in hybrids, our primary focus is a zero-emissions future with pure EV and fuel cell vehicles. We believe in fuel cell vehicles for a number of reasons, which have already been discussed. In addition to being zero emission, they're more consumer-friendly. As I think Mr. Roy had mentioned, the vehicles charge rapidly, in five minutes, and they have a substantially longer range than traditional all-electric vehicles. This addresses the two biggest consumer issues that we face, the two biggest pain points: the charge time and the range.
In addition, fuel cell vehicles require substantially fewer batteries. Really, regardless of whether a consumer chooses an electric vehicle or a fuel cell vehicle, as long as it's zero emissions, the real challenge we face is the infrastructure for charging. Both electric charging stations and hydrogen fuel cell pumps in our country are too few in number to accommodate the current and forthcoming supply of zero-emission vehicles. To change the situation, we need commitments—commitments from gas stations, retail outlets, home builders and parking operators to install the charging systems that will give all Canadians the peace of mind that zero-emission vehicles will accommodate all their transportation needs. In other words, it's going to take a village for our country to make zero emissions part of our future and turn that into a reality.
If we all pull together, I believe a zero-emission future is not just possible but inevitable, and when I say “all”, I mean everybody. It cannot be just the people who are speaking today and it cannot just be auto manufacturers. Everybody is going to have to carry their weight and get involved in this movement.
Thank you very much for your time.