The Beijing government has revealed its intention to curb the production and sale of diesel and petrol cars within the coming years, in favour of electric vehicles. It is a decision already taken by France and the United Kingdom, while in Norway charging points are already no longer sufficient.
Stopping the sale of diesel and petrol cars is something China is also considering. According to statements made by Vice Minister for Industry Xin Guobin at a meeting dedicated to the development of the automotive sector, the Beijing government is working to set a precise deadline for halting the production and distribution of vehicles with conventional engines on the market, in order to favour electric ones.
Since China represents one of the largest markets in the automotive sector, this decision would have a decidedly significant impact on the car industry and on the environment. The country's overriding objective, for some time now, has been the reduction of pollution, especially in large cities, where the sky is more often than not a grey blanket and where residents are frequently forced to wear anti-smog masks: according to a study conducted by the University of California, around 1.6 million people die in China every year from illnesses linked to pollution. The aim is therefore to curb the growth of emissions and to reduce them from 2030 onwards. And this cannot happen without intervention on traffic, where the shift towards electric cars is already being heavily encouraged through incentives and regulations. According to Beijing's plans, car manufacturers' sales will have to include electric or hybrid vehicles amounting to 8 per cent of the total in 2018, a figure that will rise to 10 per cent in 2019 and 12 per cent in 2020, until one fifth of cars sold are eco-friendly by 2025.
China is not the first case — far from it. The list of countries that will ban internal combustion engine cars in the coming decades is growing. In France, the Macron government has announced its intention to stop the sale of diesel and petrol cars by 2040 in order to achieve the goal of zero emissions by 2050. The same deadlines apply to the United Kingdom (indeed, Scotland would like to bring the deadline forward to 2032): according to data from the first half of 2017, the British are already abandoning diesel in favour of petrol cars, but above all hybrid and electric ones — the latter being the only vehicles that, along with hydrogen-powered cars, will be allowed on the road in just over thirty years. Italy is trying to keep pace with the other major European countries: a resolution passed by the Environment and Labour committees in the Senate "calls on the government to consider the possibility" of introducing a measure aimed at banning internal combustion engines, beginning as early as the 2018 budget law.
For countries, the zero-emissions target means road infrastructure interventions, the installation of charging points, incentives for electric vehicles and taxes on polluting cars. In Norway, where the ban on diesel and petrol is planned for 2025, one in three cars is already electric, but the exponential increase in the number of such vehicles is making the availability of charging points ever less adequate: in Oslo, for example, there are 80,000 electric cars on the road and 1,300 charging stations. And while electric vehicle registrations are rising by 100 per cent, the construction of charging points is running at around 26 per cent. Adapting is now the only viable path, since — fortunately — there is no going back.
