China to Grant Low-Speed Electric Car Producers Legal Status
- Government to issue permits to some qualified manufacturers
- Low-speed EV manufacturers aren’t governed by legal framework
This article is for subscribers only.
China plans to plug a regulatory gap and begin overseeing low-speed electric vehicles used mainly in the country’s rural areas, legitimizing a market segment that dwarfs sales of regular battery-electric cars made by the likes of BYD Co. and Tesla Motors Inc.
Under the current regulatory framework, there are no rules governing the production and sale of electric vehicles with top speeds below 100 kilometers per hour (62 miles per hour). The result has been a proliferation of cheap, poorly made EVs powered by polluting lead batteries that pose a threat to road safety and the environment, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said in a statement on its website.