China has seemingly taken the lead on vehicle fuel efficiency. The country will require battery-electric and plug-in hybrids to represent 10 percent of all new cars sold in 2019; the regulation is one of the toughest announced thus far for automakers.
To show the country means business, China will also end production of 553 locally-made vehicles over their fuel economy, Bloomberg reported last Friday. The lengthy list of vehicles do not meet fuel consumption limits and will help curb air pollution.
A full list of cars on the chopping block isn’t available, and the only information in the report does not source vehicle nameplate. Shanghai-GM’s “Chevrolet SGM7161DAA2 sedan” is named, however. It’s unclear if other SAIC-GM products will face their end.
Although 553 seems like a large number, Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the China Passenger Car Association, told the publication it’s a “very small” percentage of passenger car production. China is also mulling over an official date to implement an internal-combustion engine ban. The United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands and Norway have all set their own dates to ban new cars sold powered by fossil fuels.
Comments
I wonder what the trade-offs are for cutting ICE vehicles, vs China’s record imports of US coal in 2017.
I know they have an appetite for EVs – but if their electricity is largely coal-powered – well, it’s hard to draw any conclusions.
I’d guess carbon credit swaps are somehow involved, but that’s just a hunch.
Wonder what it means for Buick and Cadillac? They make those in China, too.
It’s possible despite ICE vehicle being axed that greener replacements are being offered…China’s record of US Coal imports can also be attributed to the sanctions on North Korea who was a huge exporter of coal…Using coal for electricity generation is could be China’s “cleanest” use of coal, there are various carbon capture and pre-processing that can make coal cleaner but still not “clean”…Nearly 1.4B people live in China and as the population ever increases, electricity demand will continually sky rocket…It’s reported that coal for electricity generation has decreased by a few percentages points in part thanks to solar and wind projects…However, in a lot of rural China, people have no choice other than to heat their home with coal or not heat their home…There’s also a huge amount of coal in their industrial side, think blast furnaces like where steel is made…
The article states that due to their 10% of all vehicles sold to require PHEV that’s why those models are being sunset (and most likely a portion will be replaced)…
Means nothing to Buick and Cadillac since GM has announced it should meet or exceed China’s mandates; this isn’t new news to any automaker…