As the purchase of clean cars and the charging devices stations they need is partly financed by cities, An said that municipal governments have little intention to support automakers that do not contribute to the local economy.
Municipal governments do not bend the rule even if local auto companies cannot produce enough to feed the city's demand, he added. "Their attitude is that 'If you want to get our market, you have to exchange it with investments.'"
Such attitudes, An and other experts say, have prevented Chinese clean car producers from mass production. And the forced buildup of factories also resulted in massive resources being wasted, widening the know-how gap between Chinese carmakers and their Western rivals.
To be sure, there have been some positive results. About 11,000 hybrid buses, pure electric cabs and other types of clean cars are running on China's roads as a result of the program. It also helped develop more ways to gain customer acceptance, including a business that allows drivers to try their hand at clean cars without buying them.
In 2010, Zotye New Energy Auto began leasing its electric cars in eastern China's Hangzhou with a hope to market this new product. Lured by a similar rental fee and four-fifths cheaper expenses for each kilometer driven compared with petroleum-powered cars, daily commuters welcomed those electric cars cheerfully.
Long list of lessons learned
But the rental business was sitting on a big loss due to hefty upfront investment, and the company was hesitant to provide more, said Feng Yanjie, Zotye manager.
Then the city's clean car promoters stepped in and backed up the rental business with government subsidies large enough to cover half its electric car purchasing costs as well as part of the charging expenses. That led to an increase in the number of electric cars Zotye leases, from a dozen to 100.
Some of those who rented an electric car later became buyers, Feng said. At the same time, the company is using the project to gather market feedback and make adjustments to the vehicles.
Chinese automakers are not the only ones that benefited. Liu Zhi, transportation specialist at the World Bank's Beijing office, said policymakers here learned more about the complexity of promoting clean cars as the program has shed light on problems in the implementation.
The long list of the learned lessons includes missing standards, accurate surveys on what drives public acceptance, and the need for ways to motivate manufacturers while weeding unqualified players out of the market.
While admitting its downsides, Liu said he does not consider China's clean car promotion program a failure. He added that "the important thing isn't to put as many clean cars on the road as planned, but to recognize problems along the way and leverage the learned lessons to develop future solutions."
Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from Environment & Energy Publishing, LLC. www.eenews.net, 202-628-6500
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Add CommentProof once again just because government planners say so doesn't mean the people will buy into it. Much like some of the mega cities that China has built that no one wants to live in. One problem maybe the cost, like their newly built mega cites the new homes/condos require a 50% down payment and only three years to pay it off and the cost far exceeds what most people have ever in the first place.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo electric vehicle in China can be considered "clean". China is one of the dirtiest power producers. Electric cars are merely displacing emissions to the locale of their dirtiest power stations. This has a benefit to the local cities but worsens the global impacts.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn addition to these coal powered cars, we now have to account for the polluting factors of battery manufacturing and disposal.
When China completely cleans up it's power producing sector, we will be able to refer to electrics as "clean". That glorious event is not yet evident, although the Chinese say they are making progress, they are still constructing 2 coal fired units per week. Many have no pollution controls at all. GK
Having been to a few of those pollution choked cities, I doubt petroleum powered cars are the only or even the significant cause. At best cars are a contributor to pollution produced by factories, millions of furnaces heating homes and buildings, cooking with various fuels, trucks used for shipping and a host of other pollution contributors. Also with china being the number one coal user for electricity, even if these cars were 100% PEV, the pollution from the coal plants would still be there in what ever location those are in. This is a good example of doing something, even a bad idea for good intentions but otherwise not going to solve any problem. They could remove every car on the road and it would not even be noticed as far as the effect on pollution. All that will happen here is a waste of money better spent on something useful.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnother example that political leaders are pretty much the same everywhere: they think they can make something true by passing a law that it is. Electric autos will be viable when the battery technology advances enough to make them so, not before. Pretending it is when it is not does no more good than legislating pi to be equal to 3.00 or that there is no such thing as global warming.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this'China wants..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHint..China has over 4 times the population of the USA. It's not a monolithic entity anymore than the USA is. There are competing interesdts, etc.
The USA wants....(good luck getting any consensus).
"The research found 1,231 new coal plants with a total installed capacity of more than 1.4 million MW proposed worldwide. Beyond the biggest users -- China, India and the United States -- the assessment finds a heavy coal demand building up in Russia, Vietnam, Turkey and South Africa."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.eenews.net/public/climatewire/2012/09/17/1
Takes a lot of coal to keep those clean cars on the road.
I agree. Proper government planning, such as we often do here in the US, requires input from all stakeholders, including private business and ordinary citizens of all ages, income levels and ethnicities.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Clean" isn't an all or nothing thing. Electric cars are cleaner than gas or diesel, and can become even cleaner if power plants switch to natural gas or some sustainable technology. No other technology can become cleaner that way.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou are right that passing a law assuming that batteries are cheap won't actually make them cheap. But if the law is properly designed, it can increase demand for the batteries, which increases production, which then reduces price (as we have seen with virtually every other mass-produced item.) Some people claim that once electric car production is as large as the equivalent gasoline car production, they will be as cheap as the gas versions.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"...and can become even cleaner if power plants switch to natural gas or some sustainable technology."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI believe that is exactly what I said.
"When China completely cleans up it's power producing sector, we will be able to refer to electrics as "clean"."
Euro and N.A coal fired plants have electrostatic precipitators and sulfur scrubbers. The only thing you see coming from our stacks is water vapor fog and the unseen benign CO2. Under these circumstances we can refer to electrics as "clean", in regards to pollution (ignoring the very real pollution problem of increased battery processing).
I am not against electrics... I am against dirty power generation. People must keep their eyes on the ball, in this regard. GK