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In March this year, the 10th Continental Electric Vehicle 100 Summit Forum was held in Beijing, which is known as the "100 Summit" of China's electric vehicle industry, symbolizing that China's automotive industry will continue to make efforts in the field of electric vehicles in the future.
In contrast, the major Western car companies that once led the mainland electric vehicle industry have chosen to withdraw from the electric vehicle market en masse.
Do you want to continue playing? Or do you want to play but can't? Why does the mainland continue to insist on it?
Electric vehicles that change the car paradigm
As early as 1680, the famous scientist Isaac Newton proposed the idea of "spraying steam with a nozzle" to propel manned vehicles forward, but it was not successfully realized because of the problems of industrial production capacity.
Newton
It was not until 1886 that the German engineer Benz successfully carried out various experiments on two-stroke and three-stroke cars in his factory and successfully applied for patents, officially opening the automobile era.
In fact, the successful experiment and official debut of electric vehicles are comparable to the time when the car was born.
Since 1828, electric vehicles using batteries as power sources and electric motors as driving power have begun to appear in countries around the world in capitalist countries, and in the 70s of the 18th century, electric vehicles can already be seen on the roads with horse-drawn carriages as the main means of transportation.
However, due to the technical limitations at the time, the power that electric vehicles could provide was very low, only comparable to the power output of one or two horses, which made people gradually regard electric vehicles as only a low-speed means of transportation, and the mainstream of transportation was still steam and gas-based cars.
Until the early 19th century, with the addition of Edison and other scientists, the development of battery technology has improved the quality and carrying capacity of electric vehicles, and has also been favored by women because of their ease of operation, low noise, and no peculiar smell of engine emissions, and even occupied a one-third share of the market in the United States.
However, with the rapid development of fuel refining technology and engine technology, fuel vehicles have gained more application opportunities in the First and Second World Wars, which has made electric vehicles once again neglected, and even in 1935, there was almost no shadow of electric vehicles on European roads.
What makes electric vehicles realize the opportunity to "overtake in corners" is the biggest difference between electric vehicles and cars, "fuel".
Since 1968, the price of oil has skyrocketed around the world, which has forced many car companies to reconsider electric vehicles that have been left behind in the face of sluggish car sales.
In 1971, when electric vehicles followed the footsteps of human landings on the moon with the advantage of not needing to inhale air and burning fuel to provide power, this invisibly made a high-quality advertisement for electric vehicles.
In 1973, in order to seize the market for "low-energy vehicles", major Western automakers began to turn to electric vehicles and the development of batteries and braking systems.
At the same time, at the booth of the first "Low Pollution Power Conference" that year, General Motors' electric vehicles made their debut, announcing that electric vehicles had resounded the clarion call to "kill" people's lives.
As the sales of electric vehicles in the market are increasing, the merchants who produce and sell electric vehicles are also making huge profits.
According to the statistics of 2022, in the previous year's global car company electric vehicle industry ranking, only China's Great Wall Motors ranked among the top 10 in market capitalization as the tenth place, and the rest of the companies are Western electric vehicle manufacturers.
However, according to the news released by CNBC in the United States, Western electric vehicle manufacturers such as General Motors, Ford, Mercedes-Benz, and Volkswagen have announced that they will reduce or postpone continued investment in electric vehicles, or simply announce a timetable for exiting the electric vehicle market.
So, why do these "bigwigs" in Western countries want to withdraw from the electric vehicle market?
Western "bigwigs" have withdrawn from the track?
According to the chief financial officer of the German automaker Porsche, according to the EU's current policy on fuel vehicles, Porsche will start to "brake" the investment in electric vehicle projects in 2026.
Not only in Germany, but also in the United States, France, the United Kingdom, and many other automakers have said that they "will not challenge the EU's sales ban", but only if "the appropriate conditions are met".
To be precise, the United States, Britain and other Western countries are postponing the implementation of the EU's ban on fuel vehicles, and are reducing or slowing down the production of electric vehicles.
In March this year, when the president of the European Parliament attended the meeting in Germany, he made no secret of the fact that the EU's ban on gasoline vehicles was a serious mistake and that such a wrong decision should be remedied immediately.
It can be seen from the reaction of these car companies that the attitude of the West, major car companies, politicians and even these countries towards electric vehicles has undergone a great change.
If you see through the "dual carbon plan" behind electric vehicles, you can understand why these car companies have chosen to withdraw.
You know, it was Britain that first shouted out to let the world's countries "green development" and "no longer increase the burden on the earth", and other developed countries in the West also agreed, and the mainland, as a developing country, did not hesitate to join these green measures that have become advanced countries, sacrificing the mainland to catch up with the development of industrial powers in exchange for the safety and health of the human homeland.
However, what these Western countries did not expect was that China was not limited by "carbon neutrality" as they imagined, but instead achieved rapid catch-up in high-tech environmental protection and clean energy, including electric vehicles.
Although Western countries ostensibly have a unified layout of "alliance" countries such as the European Union, in fact, they have their own "careful thinking" under the camouflage of the alliance, and it can even be said that each country has its own evil intentions.
Because of their different interests, these countries cannot fully realize the "same game of chess", let alone the easy unification of various capital companies between countries.
So why is there a consensus on stopping the development of electric vehicles? It's actually quite simple, it's for profit.
According to the financial report released by Ford, which ranks 8th in the market capitalization list of car companies in 2023, although Ford's total value is rising, it will lose $4.7 billion in the electric vehicle sector in 2023 alone. This is not the case for an established company like Ford, not to mention other small-scale manufacturers.
The main reason for this situation is that China's new energy electric vehicles have entered the Western market strongly, and under the sign of "good quality and low price", it has caused a great impact on many Western car companies.
To put it simply, Western countries have introduced China to the "carbon neutrality" bureau, but they did not expect to be "counter-killed" by China and Chinese car companies, which directly led to a decrease in their profits in the electric vehicle industry.
In order to regain profits, they choose to shelve or even abandon the track and return to the traditional fuel car track.
As for the "carbon emissions" campaign they launched, it can be selectively ignored in the face of capital and interests.
Why is only China choosing to insist?
Let's take a look at a set of data first: in 2021, Tesla sold 93,600 electric vehicles, and Toyota sold 10.495 million traditional cars, both of which were the first in sales, and the latter was 11 times that of the former, but Tesla's market value that year was 5 times that of Toyota.
The second set of data: Also in 2021, BYD, which ranked second in new energy sales, sold 594,000 electric vehicles, and Volkswagen, which ranked second in traditional cars, sold 8.885 million units, and the data was also the latter "crushing" the former, but BYD's financial report revenue increase that year exceeded Volkswagen's $134.4 billion with $140.3 billion, and Volkswagen's data also included the results of "chasing data" with hybrid vehicles in the second half of the year.
The third set of data: According to statistics in January 2022, among the top 20 global car companies in terms of market capitalization in 2021, China's BYD, SAIC, and Great Wall have all been on the list, and new energy vehicle companies such as NIO and Xiaopeng have also entered the list.
You know, BYD has just been established for more than 20 years, and Xiaopeng Motors has only been established for 5 years, so compared with old car companies such as GM, BMW, and Ferrari, it can be said that they are not at the same level at all, but with the field of electric vehicles, they have caught up with or even surpassed these old companies.
Since 2015, the mainland's new energy vehicles in the global sales scale has been ranked first for 9 consecutive years, which is not only our own huge market capacity factors, but also the state behind the backing of enterprises, enterprises can achieve scientific and technological innovation, technology leadership, but also "good quality and low price" and other reasons.
Zheng Shajie, director of the National Development and Reform Commission, said at the "100-person meeting": "As long as it is conducive to the new energy vehicles, we must dare to explore." This is not an empty word, but a reassuring pill for these enterprises to "support".
The automobile development route of Western countries is to gradually shift from diesel to gasoline and hybrid, because they either have their own oil reserves, or they can "steal and rob" oil like the United States.
The advantage of mainland China is that it has the world's largest power generation, and with the cooperation of reliable batteries provided by excellent battery R&D manufacturers such as CATL and Tianneng Group, it can achieve both "green development" and "corner overtaking".
epilogue
Regardless of whether Western countries and companies really don't want to play or really can't afford to "withdraw from the market", it will not have an impact on the direction of the mainland to continue to develop electric vehicles and green new energy projects.
As Williamson, director of the energy department of the United Nations Asia-Pacific Organization, said, China has become the world's mainstream in electric vehicle technology and will continue to lead the way.
This article was originally written by "On History and the Present", and has been opened for the whole network to protect rights, and may not be reproduced without authorization, and infringement must be investigated.