electric cars
Electric cars hyped, for now
Electric cars are riding high, as incentives and new models make them a realistic option. So why are critics questioning their staying power? Full Article | Slideshow
China invests heavily in fertile green auto ground
An EN-V, or ''Electric Networked-Vehicle'',General Motors and its China joint venture partner SAIC Motor Corp, is showcased during an event to unveil its new concept car in Shanghai March 24, 2010.
Credit: Reuters/Nir Elias
BEIJING |
BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese automakers, unscathed by a savage global downturn, are ramping up efforts to get more cleaner, low-emission vehicles on the roads, counting on the green drive to propel them into the top ranks of the global auto industry.
From leading Chinese auto group SAIC Motor Corp to rising star Geely Automotive Holding, indigenous players will show off a host of new green vehicles at the Beijing autoshow that starts this week, including some futuristic concept models.
"Green energy cars represent sort of gold mine on the horizon that all the companies hope to reach eventually," said Stephen Dyer, principal with A.T. Kearney China.
"Almost all the major Chinese manufacturers have on-going development programs. Some may be more politically motivated but clearly some are very serious pursuits that are backed by large investments and substantial research teams."
Big auto groups backed by government money, such as SAIC, are likely to emerge as winners, industry analysts say, while leading private-sector players, like Warren Buffet-backed BYD, will also be a front runner as it pushes into foreign markets.
But the road for low emission, alternative fuel vehicles in China is a long one. Sales of Toyota's Prius, the world's best-known green car, numbered just 300 in China last year, when it overtook the U.S. as the world's largest auto market.
"Frankly, it is still a little premature to say there is now or soon to be major customer demand for electric or hybrid cars in China or anywhere in the world," said A.T. Kearney's Dyer.
"In China, there may even been a higher bar to pass. This is because the majority of consumers are first time car buyers and they tend to be practical than the green energy car buyers in the U.S. who may have political or philosophical reasons."
TECHNOLOGY GAP CLOSING
Still, many companies are betting heavily on an electric and alternative fuel future, and Chinese models are expected to snatch some significant share.
SAIC, which will showcase its self-developed electric car E1 and hybrid models at the auto show, is investing 6 billion yuan ($879 million) in green vehicles. Its hybrid Roewe 750 saloon is scheduled for mass production later this year, followed by a plug-in version of a smaller Roewe 550 and E1 in 2012.
Another state-backed heavyweight, Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Co, unveiled its BE701 electric car in November and is building a 2.28 billion yuan production base on the outskirts of the Chinese capital, capable of making 50,000 electric vehicles and twice as many hybrids.
"There is still a technology gap between local and foreign (firms), but this is a relatively level playing field and the Chinese are not that far behind. They have a chance to catch up," said Mervin Guo, a senior analyst with J.D. Power.
Other industry observers cited Daimler's tie with BYD as a recognition of China's growing strength in this field.
"The Daimler-BYD tie is different from those in the early days when local automakers tended to rely heavily on their foreign partners for technologies. They are equal partners," said Chen Liang, an analyst with Huatai Securities.
Chinese automakers, however, are still newcomers with somewhat patchy reputations for quality, and are never short of critics.
"In China, they are going to develop some low cost EVs that won't have all the performance characteristics of cars we have in the Western world," said Kevin Wale, president and managing director for General Motors' China operations. "There is going to be quite a difference in the types of electric vehicles," Wale told Reuters.
The No.1 Detroit automaker will sell its much-touted Chevy Volt plug-in hybrid in China in 2011 following its North America debut later this year.
MAJOR MAKET DEMAND NOT IN SIGHT
Foreign automakers are continuing to test the waters for hybrid or electric models in China, but many are moving cautiously, given the chilly reception of some pioneering hybrid models, including Toyota's Prius, GM's Buick Lacrosse and Honda Motor's gasoline-electric Civic.
A made-in-China Prius costs as much as $41,000, nearly matching the price tag of much bigger gasoline-powered Camry, making it a turn-off for Chinese buyers, who still have a penchant for big cars.
Annual sales of imported Civic hybrids are also a few hundred, according to a Honda official, who blamed the hefty price tag of nearly $40,000 -- roughly twice as much a China-made non-hybrid version -- and lack of government incentives.
"Green cars like hybrids are expensive. Without government subsidies, the market just won't take off," said the Honda official, asked not to be identified.
Beijing pledged late last year to hand out rebates to private car buyers, expanding a pilot scheme targeting public transport operators, but no timetable has been set.
Some foreign automakers are also treading cautiously to see which technologies the government endorses before making any big investments.
Still, both GM and Nissan Motor are on track to import the Volt and Leaf next year, followed by BMW, which will bring its first hybrids for China -- a gasoline-electric BMW X6 and BMW 7 -- later this year.
On top of a formidable price tag, a lack of industrial standardization and inadequate infrastructure network are also cited as major obstacles for plug-in vehicles.
The southern boom town of Shenzhen, where BYD rolled out its plug-in hybrid, F3DM, late last year, has just three charging stations.
Moreover, the facilities, built by a major Chinese state power grid, are off-limits to other entrants like Nissan's Leaf.
"You can't charge the Leaf at the facilities as the charger just won't fit in. We'll have to have our own facilities when we sell Leaf in Shenzhen," said Tsunehiko Nakagawa, vice president of Nissan China Investment.
"We are working with local governments and other Japanese carmakers right now. We want to make sure that new charging facilities to be built could be at least be shared by us all."
($1=6.826 Yuan)
(Additional reporting Jacqueline Wong; Editing by Lincoln Feast)
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Detroit, UAW/CAW and US automakers were destroyed by the $225 standard labor charge required to remove the entire dash board assembly, to change one, or all half dozen of the backlight 12V bulbs that allow me to see my 2000 Ford Excursion’s instrument panel. They remain dark, as I refuse to pay the labor, and just turn on the overhead lights when I want to see my left most instruments. The even worst union disaster for a new vehicle owner was our AeroStar van, from Ford, the first year of that name, and it came when changing the spark plugs turned out to be a $600 plus exercise, and no independent mechanic would touch the thing, so we just traded it, and swore off Fords, until the Diesel Excursion caught my eye.
Now, Detroit, and the UAW ignore 80 million working Americans who must buy mild to 100 percent hybrid diesel electric vehicles, to survive the next OPEC petroleum supply squeeze. American truck lots are overflowing with abandoned trucks that working people cannot afford to drive, when diesel or gasoline exceeds $3.00 per gallon. We do not want, and will not buy, micro-mini plug in electrics that cost more than our house and farm, and we cannot haul our crews, tools, and family in them. Foreign hybrid truck makers will own that market.
India’s largest tractor maker is building a pickup to be sold thru the US dealerships thrown under the bus, as the UAW/CAW drive the companies they now own down the death spiral of socialism. With Hino selling mild hybrid 7.5 ton trucks, and Volvo fielding 40 ton versions with up to 25% fuel savings, ChIndia, unlike the stupid old white men who run the US automakers, will not ignore the 80 million US workers who comprise a must buy hybrid market, regardless of price. This Indian tractor builder, or BYD in China can build 25% and better diesel/CNG electric hybrids, with one, two or three axles powered electrically, for 80 million working Americans unable to buy the light, medium and heavy hybrid truck based vehicles that we must have, to survive OPEC’s next supply cut, price fixing. Those 80M ready US customers have been estimated to burn 30 to 60 percent of our imported fuels, in 4 to 10 MPG, or worse, fuel only vehicles. Worse, idling in long scale house, (tax/fee/fine extortion) lines, and overnight, to allow drivers to sleep in comfort, wastes hundreds of millions of gallons of diesel, in North America, yearly. Plug In and Out generator hybrid trucks, that power the grid during peak electric rate hours, at home, and on the road, and power our farms, camps, off grid homes, and work sites as well, while saving 25% to 100% of the imported fuel we use so much of, will pay for themselves, with sensible owners charging up from the grid, at off peak rates, and powering the grid, with home grown or farmer’s co-op bio-fuels, when resting at home. The obvious choice for long lived generator driven vehicles, is diesel, albeit bio-diesel, CNG, and other NAFTA produced fuels, exempted from all taxes, can quickly eliminate the heavily taxed fuels supplied by the OPEC terror financiers. Motorized trailer axles can be driven by batteries slung under trailer frames, to aid trucks on high mountain routes, and reclaim more of the energy involved in hill climbing. Permanent NAFTA wide, free trade, title and registration, at $50 for any new, used or converted hybrids of any weight, and exemption of hybrids from entering scales that require lane changes, or speed reductions, will end the production of fuel only trucks within a generation, and speed the conversion of all surviving truck based vehicles. Getting this sort of Break Through, Step Change,for energy independence, in one generation would require sapient congressional action, and federal regulators that know the savagery of our beggar thy neighbor tax, fee, fine, and repair extortion that is practiced in every state that has more than three or four weight and inspection stations within the state’s borders. Californication has about 50 savage revenuer stations, to strip truckers, from outside California, of limitless millions, yearly. We cannot vote them out of office, so the money is free, no matter how much it raises the cost of everything California citizens buy, sell, transport, or need, from the rest of the world. Worse yet, the multi-million dollar air conditioned inspection palaces eat up most of the revenue they steal from the rest of us, and keep high numbers of sworn law officers wasting their time collecting revenues, instead of enforcing the speed limits, and contributing to actual truck safety. Repeated millions of times annually, intense inspections of every truck entering California decreases safety, as it aligns virtually every truck driver, and trucking company in an, “US against them” road war that kills many of US in the 4000 truck accident fatalities each year, and reaps billions of dollars of waste, from the non-fatal accidents that 9 million truck drivers, driven to distraction, always at risk of losing their homes and business, at any scale they cannot avoid, become involved in.
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