Sustainable development of China’s commercial vehicles

Abstract

Automobiles are the major contributor to fuel consumption and emission of pollutants. The growth of the vehicle fleet has also placed enormous pressure on China’s energy supply and environment. Thus sustainable development of the Chinese automotive industry must pay significant attention to fuel-saving and emission-reduction of vehicles. Although commercial vehicles make up only about 20% of the entire automobile fleet, their contribution to energy-consumption and emission of pollutants is significant. Thus, priority should be given to fuel-saving and emission-reduction of commercial vehicles. As a result of concerted efforts by Chinese government, industry and enterprises, great progress has been made in technologies concerning new-energy, intelligent and lightweight automobiles. However, compared with developed countries, the level of lightweighting of commercial vehicles produced in China remains comparably low. This means that great potential for development of lightweight commercial vehicles in China exists and it will be an efficient path towards fuel-saving and emission-reduction.