Jason Tolczynski: I bought an Old Man Le and sent it back to the United States, and the people around me were envious
[Text/Jason Tolczynski, Translator/Observer.com Guo Han]
Nowadays, buying an electric car means having a hard time choosing.
In the United States, almost every major car company has its own electric vehicle style, or even several. You can get a Chevrolet Bolt or Nissan Leaf for less than $30,000 or a Porsche Taycan Turbo S for almost $200,000. You can buy electric pickups from Ford, Tesla, or Rivian, mid-size five-seaters from Hyundai, Kia, or Volkswagen, or even unusual models like Tesla's new Cybertruck. The options are dizzying.
But do you know which electric car is not readily available in the United States? The answer is the Changli Freeman, which costs $1,200 and is one of the cheapest electric cars in the world.
As a professional car commentator, I couldn't go out and test interesting models in the early days of the pandemic, so I did what I could: buy a Changli electric car on Alibaba's website. I paid $2,000 for shipping and duties, and a few months later, the car was packed in a huge cardboard box and delivered to my doorstep. It hardly looks like a car, and it's hardly a car: according to my own tests, it has a top speed of about 25 miles (40 km/h) and a battery range of about 27 miles (43 km). But it's not a toy car: it has a roof rack, a radio that plays MP3s, and even a reversing camera. I can meet more basic transportation needs with it than you can imagine.
Changli is the real reason why China has a dizzying variety of electric car markets, and Americans should be the envy of them. In the U.S., there are 50 all-electric vehicles to choose from, which may seem like a lot. But in China, you'll find about 235 models, covering almost all segments, from price, luxury, technology to practicality. Tycho de Feijter, an expert on China's car market at the Clingendael Institute, a Dutch think tank, said: "Chinese consumers are the luckiest buyers of electric vehicles in the world. "However, if you expect to buy these cars like you would buy many other Chinese-made gadgets, keep dreaming. Without them, the transition to clean energy vehicles that the United States desperately needs will be even slower.
If Tesla is the success story of electric cars in the United States, then in China, BYD is the same success story. BYD started as a mobile phone battery manufacturer until 2009 when it launched its first electric car. Two years later, when Elon Musk was asked about BYD in an interview with Bloomberg, he bluntly mocked: "I don't think they make a good product." However, in the fourth quarter of 2023, BYD surpassed Tesla to become the world's largest seller of electric vehicles. BYD has become a giant company, with about 90,000 employees in the R&D department alone, compared to Tesla's total of 128,000 employees.
Visitors view BYD's new energy vehicles at the 2023 International Motor Show in Munich, Germany, on September 6, 2023
A big reason for BYD's success is that it sells cars that are more affordable than the usual cars in the United States: BYD's best-selling model is a sleek sedan that starts at less than $14,000. Cost is one of the most compelling aspects of China's EV market: the average price of an EV in China is about $35,000, compared to more than $53,000 in the United States. When you look at the low-end market, things get really interesting. Of course, there is a Changli model, commonly known as the "old man Le" in China, which is mainly used by elderly users to take their grandchildren to and from school or to other places such as the vegetable market. I happen to live in a college town, which is perfect for hanging out in a funny little electric car, but other cheaper Chinese electric cars can do more.
Take the Changan Lumin, for example, a sleek four-seater hatchback with high-tech headlights that look like a pair of friendly eyes are on you. It has a speed of about 60 miles (96 kilometers per hour), just enough to hit the intercity highways of the United States, and costs about $7,500, which is the price of a new model. Wuling Hongguang's Mini EV is similar and more affordable, retailing for less than $5,000. For just over $12,000, you can buy the Baojun KiWi EV with a high-tech automated parking function.
In the U.S., there's no new EV that starts at just over $10,000, or even any new launch. The U.S. auto market has never been friendly to cheap cars. Automakers struggle to make money from entry-level models, which are overlooked by the market, and people are looking to another pickup truck with leather and LCD screens, often named after some stunning region in the southwest. As U.S. automakers pour billions of dollars into the electric space, electric vehicles are only amplifying this trend: there are now many very expensive sport utility vehicles (SUVs) and pickup trucks on the U.S. market, but not many others.
If you want to understand what the future era of "post-gasoline vehicles" looks like, the Chinese auto market is the closest to the future. No matter what kind of electric car you want, you are likely to find it in the Chinese market. There are sleek minivan-like crossovers, high-end electric vehicles that haven't really been classified in the U.S., and models like the Xpeng X9 and Zeekr 009, which look like the spaceships piloted by the super-rich villains of science fiction movies. Electric supercars, hardcore off-road vehicles, vans, luxury cars and family cars are also available.
China's EV market is so large that there's plenty of room for something that the U.S. EV market is sorely lacking: fun cars. I don't just mean "fast", because "fun car" is often reduced to "fast". I'm referring to the really interesting places. Electric vehicles are bringing more technology to cars like never before, but Chinese electric vehicles are characterized by almost pure futurism. You'll find instrument clusters equipped with augmented-reality, automassage seats, in-car screen mirroring, refrigerators, and even headlights with customizable emojis.
There's a Chinese model called the Ora Punk Cat, which does look a bit punk, like a vintage Volkswagen Beetle in a retro-futuristic style, with a design from the 70s and a large LCD screen (as if the name of the Punk Cat wasn't strange enough, there is a similar model in this car - Ballerina, which is specifically aimed at female users).
Perhaps all these cheaper, futuristic electric cars are exactly what the United States lacks. But one of the biggest challenges facing electric vehicles in the U.S. isn't the car, it's the charging problem. In the U.S., charging stations are still hard to find and unreliable. China's charging network is much more extensive than in the United States, even covering rural areas. Ash Sutcliffe, a spokesman and communications director for Geely, a major Chinese car company, told me that in eastern China, you basically come across a charging station every kilometer you walk.
China is also more willing to experiment with new technologies such as battery swapping, which is to replace a car with a new battery in a matter of minutes, rather than charging that huge, depleted battery. In the U.S., battery swapping has never been successful on a large scale, which is a shame given the potential to provide a more reasonable EV charging solution. Meanwhile, China's NIO has completed 30 million battery swaps.
But none of this fully explains why China's electric vehicles are more competitive and diverse than those in the United States. This is partly because China's population is mostly concentrated in dense urban areas, and issues such as charging accessibility and battery range do not affect Americans as much as they do for Americans, so EV adoption is higher in China. Unlike Americans, Chinese buyers are usually more concerned about the technical content and user experience of the car than just the driving experience, which is a positive factor for electric vehicles, because the driving experience of electric vehicles is mostly the same, according to Figget.
EV charging stations in China
The relative cheapness of Chinese cars also has to do with China's labor standards and generous state subsidies. "Chinese cities will offer additional subsidies and other benefits, such as shorter licensing times and free parking spaces. "The Chinese central government is actively supporting the creation of an ecosystem for the electric vehicle industry, covering areas from mining and battery manufacturing to automotive software research and development." "Perhaps most importantly, China dominates the global battery supply chain, producing more than 80% of EV batteries.
While much of the reason why China is leading the EV race is China's special national conditions, China's EVs are going global. Currently, Europe accounts for one-third of China's total EV exports, as Chinese brands tend to be priced lower than their competitors. BYD plans to soon launch a luxury model in Europe, the Look Up U8, which, according to the company, can float in the water for 30 minutes. But in the U.S., you can't buy these electric cars. While some automakers, such as Volvo (which was acquired by major Chinese car Geely), can sell models made in China, none of the Chinese brands can sell cars in the United States under their own name.
That's the result of steep tariffs on Chinese cars and subsidies under the Inflation Reduction Act, which is designed to help the United States develop its electric vehicle and battery industries rather than relying on China. The bill provides up to $7,500 in tax breaks for so-called "clean cars," but the incentives do not apply to cars that use parts and components made by China and "foreign entities of concern." In fact, this was done to replicate the battery advantage that China currently has. Considering that electric vehicles in China are so cheap, even such protective policies may not be enough to keep Chinese cars out. Chinese automakers already sell cars in Mexico and plan to build factories there, making it easier to sell to the United States. Musk said of Chinese EV companies last week: "I think, honestly, if there are no trade barriers, Chinese car companies will basically destroy most of the other car companies in the world." ”
Currently, the United States is missing out on some of the world's best electric vehicles. The Inflation Reduction Act may be able to do what it was supposed to do, bringing Americans a more affordable, better American-made electric car, but the longer we wait, the more carbon emissions will be generated. If you can make it a little better, you can legally import an Ora Punk or Ballerina electric car in the future, but not until 2047, 25 years after the two models are available. If anyone wants, I can share the cost of buying a container with you and shipping a few cars to the United States.
（原文于1月30日发布在美国“大西洋月刊”网站，原标题：“美国正在错过最好的电动车。 ” America is Missing Out on the Best Electric Cars.）
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