China's new energy vehicle industry takes its first steps

• Source: Gasgoo
• [10:01 January 18 2011]
• Comments

One of the controversies regarding the guideline is the exact definition of 'new electric vehicle.' In the past, hybrid models were never mentioned when discussion new energy automobiles. However, many industry insiders believe that as the marketization of new energy technology is extremely slow, and because popularization of hybrid vehicles has the potential to reduce energy waste in a relatively short period of time, that these vehicles are a very effective tool to help ease the transition to new energy automobiles.

The guideline does designate electric vehicles as being an important direction for the automobile industry to go towards. According to the guideline, "China will embark on production of plug-in hybrid electric and pure electric vehicles, while speeding up research on fuel cell-powered automobile technology.” Chen Quanshi, head of the electric vehicles branch of the Society of Automotive Engineers of China (SAE-China), said that, in the end, hybrids would be categorized as 'energy-efficient vehicles.' Development will be focused on pure electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, he added, saying, "When selecting what road we should take, we have to first decide whether our goal is coming up with a new technological breakthrough or industrialization? Since the goal is industrialization, we have to put all our efforts towards that. Hydrogen fuel cells will be the eventual goal, but currently the industry doesn't meet the necessary production requirements.

With large amounts of funds lined up for investment and policies from the very highest level, automobile manufacturers across the industry are coming up with plans and strategies for new energy technology. Incomplete statistics show that at least 60 companies have put out new campaigns. However, enthusiasm alone is no substitution for actual technological progress, and with the country's automobile industry currently lacking in this aspect, popularization of new energy vehicles will have to wait.

It is under this background that China's new energy automobile industry takes its first long, hard steps.