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GM, Shanghai firm to make hybrid buses in China

SHANGHAI - US General Motors Corp, the world's biggest auto maker, has announced that it will cooperate with the Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC) in manufacturing of hybrid bus in China next year to promote the technology for cleaner, more fuel-efficient vehicles.

GM and SAIC will begin by developing one bus and test-run it in Shanghai to see whether the vehicle would be commercially viable in China, said a GM senior official.

The number of vehicles on China's roads is soaring, bringing a growing reliance on imported oil and worsening already severe air pollution. Traffic jams is also a big headache for most big cities in China.

The Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology has fixed development of hybrid vehicle as one of the key projects in the Tenth Five-Year Plan period (2001-2005) and the State 863 Program as car emissions are choking China's cities.

Based on commercial operation in the United States, hybrid buses can help improve fuel efficiency by 40-60%, and reduce emission by 50-90% as compared with ordinary types of buses.

If the 17,000 buses now operating in Shanghai could be changed to hybrid ones, they could save about 4 million tons of oil each year.

Shanghai Automotive also has its own program to develop buses fueled with natural gas.

(Asia Pulse/XIC)

Oct 14, 2004

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