EU duties might not be enough to hold off flood of Chinese EVs Import duties of 40 to 50 percent will be needed to shield the European auto industry from China-based producers, according to a new report. The European Commission launched an investigation into subsidized electric cars from China in 2023 and warned that subsidy duties might be imposed nine months later. With the deadline …
So EU makes manufacturing difficult and expensive.
Companies move manufacturing to Asia to be able to make decent profit.
The EU adds duty so that product costs as much as if it was manufactured in the EU. Just that the money doesn't go to the workers but to the bureaucrats playing Sims in real life.
Either way workers get ripped off (EU workers by not having jobs, Asian workers for earning peanuts).
To make matters worse, China now controls the majority of the mining operations around the world (BBC article published today) to obtain the materials needed for the EV batteries, so even if the EU want to get control of the manufacturing, they'll still need to look to China for the materials, which will likely be prices to compensate for any duties on Chinese goods.
So not only will the increased Duties on Chinese EV's not really work, but the supposed 'green' credentials of the EV's are dependent on China's approach to mining (please refer to said BBC article on what that means these days).
Or the EU and anyone else who wants to avoid buying from China will have to compete for what materials are not being mined by Chinese companies, which means higher demand and that means increases in prices.
So it's not just the worker who gets shafted - it's the consumer, too.
I assume you are referring to this article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-68896707 good article - worth linking.
Given that EV market share is a piddling 5%, with 14% of new cars being EVs, (and that's the UK which has a relatively high level of EV adoption): The scale of environmental destruction required to electrify all vehicles on the planet, never mind the scale required to produce grid-storage for "dunkelflaute" days, is utterly mind-boggling.
It feels like a soft-war tactic to me: During peacetime, get your enemy to close down all its heavy industry while bolstering your own - makes it easier to invade or vassalise them when you need to.
European car makers were doing fine with IC cars (at least thy did up to the start of the current round of trade wars).
Experience has taught us that established car manufacturers have a hard time with electric systems. Tesla taught us what it took to develop a competitive mass market electric car and everyone here knows the ups and downs of that company and what it took to make it successful. Established car companies haven't fared to well. In the US GM had an early entry with the EV1, the product of a Federal mandate, but they were never particularly enthusiastic about it and once the got the chance to discontinue it they didn't just stop making it but destroyed all trace of it. The lackluster approach to electric cars has left a void in the market that other companies are keen to fill -- the cars are simpler to make so once the component technology is sorted out they can be mass produced quite cheaply.
(Here it doesn't help that the average price of a new vehicle has inflated rapidly. In the US, for example, the average cost is around $40K and there's nothing on the market under $20K. A lot of people just can't afford that type of money -- you're looking at monthly payments for the car $500 and up and that's before running costs.)
Anyway, tariffs are just a form of tax.......
Traditional car makers don't make cars anymore. That stopped long ago. They assemble them from bits and pieces they buy elsewhere. Engine controllers from Bosch, Valeo instrument clusters, Wabco ABS systems, Magneti Marelli alternators. Some of them don't even make their own engines anymore. They buy them from other makers. Engineering is nonexistent. The difference between a model 2024 and last years is 2 extra cupholders and a new ugly pastel paint that looks like something my 3 month old daughter produced after filling up on formula.
Same with most complex heavy-engineering products - e.g. trains. Very few manufacturers these days make all the major components of a locomotive (which was the norm in the past).
And nearly all mass-market smaller electricals, even the mid-to-higher end items (audio equipment, etc) is outsourced to Chinese factories. Apart from a few specliaist industries, we make bugger all of significace in the UK now and the impending closure of the last blast furnaces should never be allowed to happen.
I'd risk saying that this is because of decline of manufacturing. Fewer people go into this trade, because there are no jobs and if they manage to find any, they are poorly paid. So only people going to that trade are crazy who love tinkering, but don't have money to start own business and research and wages don't enable them to amass any capital.
What I am trying to say is that Tesla probably managed to scoop those people and there was not many left for other companies to use and abuse.
Bear in mind workers, for big corporations, are just entries in a spreadsheet, a cost that is itching to be cut.
"Manufacturers" if they "make" something in Europe, they order components in China and only assemble them, doing mostly "dumb" work. You still have people who design things and develop firmware, but that is getting outsourced too.
Perhaps, & maybe I an wrong, the issue is that European EVs are simply too expensive.
The EU's obsession with BEVs is completely skewing and stuffing up manifesting because the wretched things are just so big and expensive. Small ICE vehicles (Aygo, Up, Fiat 500) are far better overall, particularly in urban areas.
Just compare the size of the average small BEV with what was a small ICE, it is utterly ridiculous. I did look at an eUP when we were considering changing my wife's 2012 Up. Taking a conventional Up & eUP at 1 year old I simply could not justify paying double the cost. I don't care what the running costs are it will take far too long to recoup the difference. The eUp would have done 99% of the journeys it would be used for.
China wins on anything like this because their manufacturing costs are lower. It is as simple as that.
Their manufacturing costs are "lower". What, because they are "more efficient"?
No, because their energy is cheap, their labour is cheap, and exports of finished goods are subsidised, and exports of raw materials are taxed.
Energy is cheap, remember , as most of it comes from coal.
Corporate USA and Europe have been nickel and dining their own people, and facilitating jobs and manufacturing overseas for 50 years.
When you add Countries in in the EU - sometime facilitated by self-serving former politicians - into outsourcing their energy needs (Dependancy on Russian Gas) and also an over-reliance on *cheap* grain, sunflower oil and fertiliser from Ukraine and energy from the Middle East.
… you are effectively enriching and arming your enemies at your expense- weaponising commodities, global trade and manufacturing.
How do you think Putin is financing his war???
It is not as simple as that.
Short term profit drives a lot of the offshoring of manufacturing. Now combine that with a consumer market that expects things to break or simply be replaced after 2 or 3 years and long term quality is irrelevant. This all happened 30 years ago.
Take consumer electronics & white goods, these are replaced monotonous regularity because a "new upgraded version" has been produced. Then we have stuff that is simply not built to last. It is cheaper to but a £5 bearing in the washing machine than a £10 bearing. Then after 3 years it expires & is chucked.
People don't expect to repair stuff even if it is cost effective.
I hear this argument a lot about "bad sanctions". Of course they increase prices - that's the idea. And yes, initially, the money goes into government coffers. But that is an undesirable side-effect - since local industry is not competing against unfairly-low import prices (due to direct and indirect subsidies in the foreign country), it can produce and sell goods at a price that matches or undercuts the tariffed import price.
it's about fair competition.
"Increasingly, Chinese and foreign manufacturers are taking advantage of China's cheaper labor and energy prices ..."
Taking advantage of slave labour and dirty power generation to produce 'green' vehicles -- Oh the irony!
Chinese companies like BYD are making some pretty good EVs when compared to Western efforts, especially Tesla.
Of course, the problem with all EVs is they're all pretty much disposable once the traction battery starts giving trouble out of warranty.
I've got a small 15 year old petrol car. Don't drive much, and it's perfectly adequate. How is it "green" to throw away cars after 8-10 years? Even if they aren't used much, the battery is going to deteriorate significantly because that's what happens with that type of battery.
"If you have a small car and ‘don’t drive it much’ an EV small car you ‘don’t drive much’ will also last 20 years."
It won't - Lithium batteries deteriorate over time even if they don't go through that many charge cycles. After 20 years (or well before that) it's likely to be pretty much buggered.
And when I do use the car, it's mostly in a very rural area. The nearest public chargers are going to be miles and miles away, and if roads get closed the detours can be massive.
"I've got a small 15 year old petrol car. Don't drive much, and it's perfectly adequate. How is it "green" to throw away cars after 8-10 years?"
In your case, it's not very green. You've already made the bulk of the environmental impact in the production and long running of your existing car - keep doing what you are doing and only replace your perfectly adequate car once you have to (ie it is beyond reasonable repair). Replace "car" with "stuff" in that last sentence and the old hippy in me is summing up a lot of what he thinks is wrong with the industrialised world today, sigh.
However, once you are at that state of needing to replace it, that's when it's worth making the decision between what type of car, trading off things like the relative environmental impact of initial production, long term running, your own likely mileage etc. And it's not a simple consideration as many of those environmental impacts are different and can't be easily compared. For instance, how different is the impact of mining the lithium for your new EV from the CO2 emissions over the lifetime of an ICE vehicle? One form of habitat damage Vs another, so which is your preference?
A few years ago, I think it was jaguar who ran some adverts saying that the CO2 emissions from building their EV was about the same as from 50k miles of driving their ICE version. Even if that figure was accurate, it was only one aspect, didn't account for the impact of refining the oil to burn, the mining of the materials for the battery, recycling of the vehicles etc.
I drive about 60 mi / 100 km a day. My Toyota has over 260,000 miles on it, and it can easily hit 360,000 if I change the oil regularly and frequently. It's almost 20 years old, and still in good condition all around. Even an eight-year warranty wouldn't cover a car I'd consider worth purchasing.
I bought a new Ford Focus (petrol) in 1999, kept it fro over 20 years. The only reason I do not still have it is that after a decade or so the seals protecting the car form water ingress (rain) perish and water shorts the electrics. Had I known, I would have had them replaced and still be driving that car. Admittedly the man I sold it to for scrap said modern cars are not built so well these days and I'd never get 130,000 miles out of a modern car, but well-maintained and not thrashed IC cars do last a while.
"Of course, the problem with all EVs is they're all pretty much disposable once the traction battery starts giving trouble out of warranty."
For me, the problem with Chinese EV's isn't the car itself, it is almost assuredly the rampant data collection that will be going on behind the scenes in both the car and the mobile support app associated with it. We know that all the EV companies are using you as a data mine once you purchase the vehicle, and all that data (plus, possibly, more, if they can help it) going to China?
No thanks.
Tinfoil not required here.
China slurps data. Lots and lots of data.
And given my german, privacy respecting car negotiates with my power supplier every time I plug it in for a recharge (phev not ev - long distances with patchy ev recharge infrastructure assured that decision), and the connected app knows how many miles I travelled each day including times and from/to, there is a LOT of data. Germany is anal about privacy. China not so much.
What tinfoil hat is needed? Tesla, Ford, GM, Hyundai...all have synchronized mobile apps to allow you to do things like track location, pre-warm the car interior and assist in destination programming.
Do you really believe that they AREN'T collecting data on you???! Really? They all admit it, if you bother to ready the EULA.
And the Chinese won't do it, too?? Go ahead, pull my finger and tell me another one.
"And the Chinese won't do it, too??
Of course they will. If it's a profitable undertaking. But I'll be damned if I can see how all this data collection has a positive effect on bottom lines. For anyone. If, as I strongly suspect, there's no money to be made there, then the Chinese probably won't bother once they figure that out.
> If, as I strongly suspect, there's no money to be made there, then the Chinese probably won't bother once they figure that out.
Outside of China, there is more money to be made by the non-Chinese car makers, who can sell the data on to your insurance provider without being tangled in US regulations.
So a Chinese export car will be the lesser data slurper.
Except for Aliexpress ads for cheap brake pads on your entertainment console, but those will be less intrusive than the US adverts, so still a win.
"...What tinfoil hat is needed?..."
Tinfoil hat is needed because - IF YOU READ THEIR COMMENT - they acknowledge that other manufacturers collect data too, but China appears to be a specific mental stumbling block for them due to paranoia or whatever:
"We know that all the EV companies are using you as a data mine once you purchase the vehicle, and all that data (plus, possibly, more, if they can help it) going to China?..."
Well, Google and one or two others are actually in the personal data business. What they actually sell is ad targeting. So yes, obnoxious though it may be, data collection is a meaningful element of their business. But I think most of the data collectors actually have no real use for most of that data. They are likely just collecting it because everyone does it so it must be good.
If I'm right about that, and I think I likely am, and if online security doesn't somehow improve significantly, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see the prevailing attitudes slowly shift from data_is_good__You_can_never_be_too_rich_or_too_thin_or_have_too_much_data toward data_is_toxic_save_only_what_you_need_and_delete_that_as_soon_as_you_reasonably_can.
One can hope.
It's not just China, everyone is doing it. A mate of mine ordered a Toyota Hilux, discovered in the paperwork that it has an esim in it constantly phoning data home. He asked to have it disabled and Toyota told him if he disables it he loses warranty coverage.
Given the BYDs are designed primarily for the Chinese market, I think it's a fair assumption that a lot of their baked-in data gathering is even more extensive than cars from EU manufacturers.
Can't do that in the US. It's illegal to void the warranty on an entire car because you disable data collection.
it's also illegal to require OEM parts be used for repairs unless the manufacturer provides them for free. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnuson%E2%80%93Moss_Warranty_Act
I suspect it's similar in Europe, check your local laws.
The West is nowhere near China's 1984-like society.
You want a social credit system? An electronic-money-only society where all your means of subsistence can be taken away from you in a second? You want millions of CCTV cameras with facial recognition in the street? Then go to China. From there, I can tell you the UK and the USA will look like a privacy paradise.
China is just further down the road - there is no doubt that the UK and the USA are heading in the same direction. The politicians are a bit more subtle about it because these are alleged deocracies (i.e. we get to choose between two awful options which are nearly the same anyway every few years), but the trajectory is basically the same.
I certainly don't trust official positions where there is good reason to doubt them - the government is not your friend, neither are large coporations! I also don't trust the mainstream media as they simply parrot official lines (BBC), with a slant towards their readership as required (Guardian to the left, Telegraph to the right, etc).
The OBSESSION is not that the Chinese will be doing it, it is WHAT they are going to be doing with that data. You remember: China has almost no data privacy laws, especially for non-citizens. How willing are you to have the Chinese government build a profile of you?? You seem to have a concern when there is suspicion of the U.S. will be doing it to EU citizens, but now EVERY country can participate in Chinese data collection!
Sign me up!! [/s] Not.
You have no idea what you are talking about. All you do is spreading FUD. China has a data privacy law called PIPL, with fines up to 5% of annual turnover, which is a higher number than what GDPR has.
https://www.mondaq.com/china/data-protection/1122748/the-comparison-between-chinas-pipl-and-eus-gdpr-practitioners-perspective
When I look at the prices for EVs and compare them to the very nice Peugeot 207 with all the extras that I bought some 12 years ago, the EVs are hideously overpriced. If the only option for me to buy an EV is restricted to overpriced EU manufactured models, it looks like I'm going to be hanging on to my Peugeot for as long as I can keep it running cost effectively.
" the EVs are hideously overpriced."
Of course they are. Even American consumers -- not noted for being the sharpest knives in the cutlery drawer -- seem to have figured that out. EV sales in the US look to have peaked and seem to be declining
I expect that China and India will come to dominate the world EV markets with cheap, utilitarian glorified golf-carts. Won't go very far or fast. But they'll get a family into town or get a few hundred kilos of cabbages to market. Won't help those of us in North America, the EU, or UK much I expect as it's unlikely they'll meet even minimal developed world safety standards much less be affordable after tariffs. Meanwhile ... what'll happen in the developed world is a complete mystery to me.
> what'll happen in the developed world is a complete mystery to me.
Looking at the video from the Waymo taxi incident and the increasing appearance of hire schemes, the old farts will hang onto their ICE cars until they drop (both cars and drivers) whilst the youngsters will be out on electric unicycles and scooters.
When the cool kids get old enough to afford homes and starting a family, an electric tuk tuk will look like an suv by comparison to their hoverboard.
Thus will we usher in a utopia of low impact transport in our cities.
In dire contrast to the Big Country, where rednecks will discover that a badly maintained battery pack generates enough heat and dense smoke that they can continue playing at "rolling coal".
"EV sales in the US look to have peaked and seem to be declining"
I have read that several times lately and I don't know how that is being reported. The actual data shows that EV sales are still going up every quarter. The industry website below says:
"...each company [in the US] except Ford sold more EVs in the first three quarters of 2023 than they did in all of 2022. Furthermore, each company shown sold more EVs in Q3 2023 than they did in Q3 2022."
It goes on to say "although Ford and General Motors are scaling back near-term production because of slowing demand relative to previous forecasts, both companies still plan on selling more EVs than ever before and remain committed to an electric future.” Maybe that is where the "EV sales are declining" messages are coming from. Basically Ford and GM over estimated the growth, but they and everyone else is still selling more and more EVs in the US every quarter.
https://theicct.org/us-ev-sales-soar-into-24-jan24/#:~:text=EV%20sales%20increased%20from%20about,to%20375%2C000%20in%20Q3%202023.
If you had said Honda Jazz or Toyota Yaris I would be agreeing with you…. Not some nasty piece of French shit from (what’s now) Stellantis (with significant Chinese investments it) and expanding tentacles into Chinese JV’s https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2023/10/26/stellantis-to-invest-1point6-billion-in-chinese-ev-start-up-leapmotor.html
Fiat, Chrysler, Dodge, Peugeot, Alfa Remeo, Vauxhall, Citroen don’t exactly leap off the page on a reliability, desirability and as in the same revered engineering Behemoth sense as the Japanese and South Koreans like Honda, Toyota, Subaru, Hyundai/Kia (and Nissan to a lesser extent perhaps it’s bankruptcy avoiding historical JV with Renault here does help it is trying to exit from).
Bugger all chance of that in the UK, especially outside of large cities. The occasional bus if you are lucky, and grotty, overpriced trains (on those few days when one group or other of railway staff aren't on strike due to the disputes which the government are clearly stringing out indefinitely).
Uncle Sam will put it's move to EV into neutral or even reverse - knowing that otherwise the country will be flooded with vehicles made in China. A lifeline for Detroit is on its way soon.
Then the US will put into overdrive its pressure on Europe not to buy EV's from China. At the same time all sorts of phantom national security issues will be found.
Will they just reclassify EV’s as (protectionist) Trucks.
Job done.
Well apart from the BMW, VW, Honda, Nissan, Toyota, Subaru, Hyundai, Kia plants in the US or semi-tractor aquisition by Volvo, Scania(read VW) and Mercedes… though I suppose they are still made in the US:
.. on cars in China for decades, now is the problem when EU are on their boots. It's a theirs turn, be a gentleman & take the hit, you will learn something new at least (law of the nature).
This is the main problem for the EU:
"EU imports of EVs from China have grown spectacularly in recent years, increasing from $1.6 billion in sales in 2020 to $11.5 billion in 2023. They account for 37 percent of all EV imports in the bloc."
About the data issue, Google freely makes a map in every city, and it is used for wars, StarLink "free world net" is used for war in an express speed, and EV data will be used, like a Social and mobile data is.
Data for EV Level 2 driver assistant is about 4Gb per hour, small portion goes external and they are stored inside the countries own data center, without permission you can't access them or transfer. You need a 5G network for Level 3 a 24Gb per hour, connected vehicle system, IoV - internet of vehicles.
Why wait for tariffs to give the extra margin to governments when you can “blend in” to local car vendor pricing, not cause mass unemployment reactions and keep the profits in the company. Smart. Oh, and my dream car is now a BYD Seal…
Add the destruction of energy grids with unreliables and it seems the EU is focusing in the wrong direction.
Don't worry, mate. Once the Channel interconnect is severed then the UK can find its rightful post-brexit place as a powerhouse industrial economy driven by coal, steam and oil. With diesel and/or petrol cars aplenty.
All together now ...
And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
Enforce reporting of cleanliness of power used in manufacture- and charge them a carbon fee equivalent to Europe's burden.
Enforce employee living standards for any manufacturer of a significant size.
Enforce things like non-Conflict metals.
Enforce safety systems and certification.
Enforce warranty cover.
And enforce these standards with any developed nation we do business with, not just China.
If China can produce vehicles that are equivalent in social good, Green-ness and safety- and are suitably well equipped and performant to be desirable in the Market- and still make enough profit to scare the European car manufacturers, then there's a problem that can't be solved by just tariffs. The EU can then look at what the problem is and improving themselves rather than making things expensive to pretend they need to be.
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