[Nilesh5417]

Found this piece of news here:

In order to bring down the harmful effects caused by pollution, the Chinese government has brought stricter laws to reduce emissions and also increase the focus on greener vehicles. The China Vehicle Technology Service Centre has now reportedly banned over 553 cars that do not abide by the set fuel economy figures. These cars include models from popular brands like Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Volkswagen. The complete list of cars that have been banned has still not been let out. However, it is said that most cars are sedans. The ban on these cars has come into effect from January 1, 2018.

It was already known that China has been increasingly promoting alternative fuels for vehicles for a long time now. In fact, last year, the sale of electric vehicles stood at 3.36 lakh units a year, which is also expected to grow further. 553 cars for a small part of the large number of cars that are produced and sold in the country. The above mentioned names are of popular car brands, not to forget China also houses local brands that make cheaper replicas of popular offerings.

The air quality has been worse in China, similar to what we have experienced in Delhi-NCR in India. However, in Beijing, the Chinese capital, has recorded an improvement in the air quality, that is said to be the best in the last nine years. This can be also credited to the improved weather conditions in Beijing. According to Reuters, the average levels of pollutants in Beijing has come down to about 35 per cent from that in 2012, with the maximum change recorded in 2017.

A second link i found after googling provides some better insights:

In China's latest tough anti-pollution measure, it is halting sales of 553 models of vehicles that don't meet fuel-consumption standards.

The halt in production of those 553 models will begin Jan. 1, the China Vehicle Technology Service Center said in a statement Thursday that was reported by Bloomberg News. On the list are models from Audi, Beijing Benz and Chevrolet.

China has tackled its chronic pollution problem by implementing curbs to steel production, restricting coal usage, and its multiyear plan to phase out vehicles powered by fossil fuels. But this is its first official ban of a specific list of polluting vehicles, said Wang Liusheng, a Shanghai-based analyst at China Merchants Securities.

"To emphasize a cut back on energy consumption, such documents will surface frequently in the future," Wang said in an email to Bloomberg. "It's an essential move to ensure the healthy development of the industry in the long run."

It's unclear how many distinct vehicles are produced in China, but the 553 models form a "very small" percentage said Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the China Passenger Car Association.

[dark.knight]

A good "move?" will always be the statement made with regards to outright ban on cars, be it a specific model or engine. Its also very well known that China woke up to the pollution issues a little too late.. increasing pollution is like a leak in a boat, you have to plug the hole immediately or you'll be spending many hours throwing out the water that has collected before sealing the patch.

Fuel economy is a very vague term, and is most often used in the context of affordability (economy itself is a monetary term, rather than say fuel consumption), than using it in the correct term of miles/kms per gallon/litre. Even then its impossible to have a certain standard of fuel consumption until all cars are of exactly the same weight and with similar engine specs. What most commuters still do not realize is that, perhaps its time to make sacrifices in the name of the environment and to preserve this little island that we live in for that much longer.

As far as the Chinese government goes, I still think they waited too long and now they have to resort to such drastic measures to curb pollution. I don't know what the immediate future of automobiles is, maybe it'll be autonomous driving or maybe it'll be electric cars or at the least, hybrid to begin with.. most companies are already there and have been at it for 2-3 years now.

But at the end of the day, I realize that the air quality and water quality trumps every other need by a hundred miles, and for that no sacrifice is too big.

[V.Narayan]

It would be interesting to hear the reactions from team BHP members to this. It would be even more interesting to guess what the reactions would have been if such a move had been implemented in India - probably ten thousand voices condemning the Govt to start with. We already have many grumbling about the ban of vehicles over 15 years old in the NCR. It is not known what criterion the Chinese regulators applied to determine which cars but for now they should be given the benefit of the doubt. On another angle altogether - one is the quality of the exhaust; the other is the quantity of the exhaust. With cars and their engines getting bigger every decade the sheer volume of exhaust per car is maybe 2X higher than a generation ago. When I turn the pages of my old Observers book on Cars of 1973-74 I see that most of the upper end European cars had engine sizes in the 1.5 to 2.5 litre range and the pages are full of smaller mid-sized cars in the 1.0 lite range and several in the sub- one litre category. And this was on the cusp of just before the Japs charged in. Compare that with cars today.

[GTO]

Had come across this news yesterday. A couple of points from the back of my head:

- China is the biggest car market in the world. When it dictates (as China usually does), there are no arguments. Car makers have to follow.

- The list of 553 cars has variants of the same model categorised separately. That means the number of models will actually be lower.

- It's not a crackdown on foreign brands. There are a large number of Chinese car makers on the list too.

[VW2010]

I think it is a good idea. They fortunately can pump money into electric public transport. They are not just cracking down on cars, but also on Manufacturing sector. They have to be serious about reversing the effect and it will be drastic and impacting manufacturers. It was cheap to manufacture

What i want countries like us is to learn. If we dont take action now we will end up there.

[blackwasp]

Aligning with their stand to reduce pollution in the country, China has banned the sale of 553 car models from January 1, 2018. Earlier last year, China declared that it was working on a deadline to phase out fossil fuel powered vehicles. According to a media report, the chairman of the China Passenger Car Association said that the banned models form a small percentage of the total sales.

China Vehicle Technology Service Centre revealed that the banned models include FAW VW’s Audi FV7145LCDBG sedan, Beijing Benz’s Benz BJ7302ETAL2 sedan and Shanghai GM’s Chevrolet SGM7161DAA2 sedan. Further, this is the first time that the authorities have come up with a list of vehicles that are polluting. The results have ensured that China is no longer in the list of top 10 countries with the most pollution in at least one parameter. This list is now lead by India, Bangladesh and Thailand.

The capital city of Beijing has seen an improvement in quality of air by almost 20 percent in 2017 as compared to 2016. This is based on the average concentration levels of harmful particles in the air known as PM2.5.



Source - Autoblog

Link to the Team-BHP News

[Lone Ranger]

I for one am glad that China is tackling its air pollution problem head on. They are not doing it with a blinkered approach either by just targeting the auto industry - they are either shutting down or restricting production of units of their steel and cement industries. This will hopefully give our own government an impetus to address this issue in a forward thinking manner rather than on a reactive basis. Environmental pollution is a can that is easily kicked down the road in order to reap short term benefits but it is the deadliest threat to our economic progress as a country.

[narayans80]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

It would be interesting to hear the reactions from team BHP members to this. It would be even more interesting to guess what the reactions would have been if such a move had been implemented in India

Remember the EESL tender that Tata and Mahindra were working, here's the state of the project as of New Year Day.

And this is from an agency that works for the government, that sensationally declared we'll be all EV in 2030.

I doubt there more than 300 EVs sold in year in India compared to 3.36L in China.

So we copy China only for their bans and not the work that they did towards the goal? Atleast that's how the kneejerk odd-even and 2L+ diesel bans have gone.

[anand.shankar]

They banned 553 models ? how many do they have ?? I don't think we have half of that in total with all the brands and variants put together!!

[arunphilip]

Originally Posted by GTO

- The list of 553 cars has variants of the same model categorised separately. That means the number of models will actually be lower.

Originally Posted by anand.shankar

They banned 553 models ? how many do they have ?? I don't think we have half of that in total with all the brands and variants put together!!

Already answered by GTO - these are variants of models, not discrete models themselves.

Also, my subjective opinion is that China has a larger variety of brands (especially domestic brands) compared to India, hence 553 isn't as large as it sounds.