REYKJAVIK, Iceland — Volkswagen hasn’t even launched its sixth-generation Golf and small details are already surfacing on the seventh generation of Europe’s long-running top seller.Industry sources have told Automotive News Europe that when the next Golf arrives in 2012 the lower-medium car will feature an all-new platform and offer a powertrain portfolio designed to reduce the entire model line’s CO2 emission dramatically.

There will be a low-CO2 version of the sixth-generation Golf — the BlueMotion variant that will emit 99 grams of CO2 per kilometer compared with 119g/km on the current Golf BlueMotion — but the rest of the car’s derivatives will have CO2 emissions as high as 166g/km.

One way VW plans to reduce emissions in the entire Golf model line is by giving the seventh-generation car more fuel-efficient engines. Another way to make the car greener is to make it leaner.

“The first step in downsizing is to not increase the size of a new model,” Walter de’ Silva, VW group design director, told ANE when asked to provide some clues about the seventh-generation Golf.

The Golf that debuts next month in Paris is 5mm shorter but 20mm wider than the current Golf.

De’ Silva dismissed speculation that the next Golf will arrive in 2012, but he also confirmed that he and his team already are working on generation seven.

“The Golf is the most important model for the VW brand,” he said. “The work [on it] never ends.”