Future of the automobile industry lies in the electric car, and major automobile manufacturers want to tie up with Chinese manufacturers to capture the fast growing markets. china is serious about Electric Cars because its ultimate goal is to impose a ban on the sale of gasoline- and diesel-powered cars.
Auto giants like Volkswagen, General Motors, and Ford Motor have already drawn up tentative plans to enter into joint ventures with Chinese firms.
While Volkswagen will produce the cars in China, General Motors have plans to conduct R & D activities of this genre of cars in that country.
As far as Ford Motors is concerned, it wants to tie up with a French and a Japanese carmaker and create joint ventures in China to produce electric cars.
Demand for electric cars
New York Times reports that the Chinese have always set the trend in technological advancements through their high-speed trains and wind turbines. It wants automobile manufacturers of America, Europe, and Japan to part with their technical knowledge. In exchange, China offers them an opportunity to exploit the enormous global market for electric cars. It has invested in car-charging stations and is determined to influence the people to switch over to battery-powered vehicles.
The auto industry is aware of the risks involved in shifting their electric car design and production setups out of their countries.
However, in the final reckoning, the risks of technology transfer could be offset by the gains of tapping new markets. It has been predicted by a global consulting company that the sale of battery-powered cars in China could reach a figure of nearly 400,000 by 2019. It is a market that cannot be ignored by any automaker.
Electric cars can ward off global warming
The main reason to promote the electric car is to reduce carbon emissions which lead to global warming. This phenomenon results from the generation of CO2 due to burning fossil fuels like petrol and diesel. These are the fuels that power present day automobiles and the electric car eliminates the use of such fuels.
That helps to arrest global warming which is the single largest factor responsible for the ills of today like floods, hurricanes, droughts etcetera.
Automobile manufacturers have realized that vehicles powered by fossil fuels are on the way out and China is poised to make an impact in this emerging market. The United States has not signed the Paris accord on climate change, but automakers in America know that the days are numbered for vehicles that run on fossil based fuels. They have to make way for electric cars that do not have problems of carbon emission.