NPR today features a report on China moving strongly to increase the number of electric vehicles on its roads to 70% by 2025! Currently, the Auto Shanghai automotive expo “is filled with SUVs and electric hybrid vehicles” and has the voice of none other than Leonardo DiCaprio pitching the future of electric vehicles. I like his pitch: “Let us reconnect with nature, fill our lungs with clean air instead of pollution, let us see beauty more clearly. With new energy, we can see this future. Now let’s make it ours.” — juxtaposed with large photos showing Beijing covered in smog and children wearing pollution masks.
The story includes descriptions of several different ways that the government in China or in local cities are successfully promoting electric vehicles, and points out that China is now the largest automotive market in the world. I hate to contrast China’s policies in this regard with those in our own U.S., but you can’t avoid it, can you? U.S. car manufacturers are looking to have a presence in the Chinese market, so will be spurred to produce more electric vehicles, in more types, and so will agitate to get our federal and state governments to provide subsidies to promote electric vehicle purchases here as well. How ironic a change from the days of “Who Killed the Electric Car?” (the devastating 2006 documentary about GM killing the EV1 electric car).