The European Parliament is expected to vote Friday on whether to impose hefty tariffs on imported EVs from China — part of a bid to protect its automotive industry from low-cost, subsidised competition.
And the United States has sought to stop a flood of cheap Chinese electric cars from flooding its markets, undercutting its own car giants and pricing out American workers.
Western powers have long raised concerns about the risks of Chinese “overcapacity”, fuelled by Beijing’s vast industrial subsidies and waning consumption at home.
But experts say that with the West keen to hit ambitious climate goals and the need to speed up the transition to green energy, it can ill-afford to prop up its stagnating car industry.
“There is no way the EU and US can reach their climate goals within the timeframes they’ve originally articulated without the help of Chinese EVs,” Tu Le, managing director at Sino Auto Insights, told AFP.
“They’ll either need to reconcile their goals or allow some entry of Chinese EVs.”
China long lagged the West in its auto sector and in the push for green energy to curb rising emissions, of which it remains the world’s largest producer.
But a push to expand green energy production and reduce China’s emissions has seen production of EVs and their necessary components soar.
That policy has led Beijing to more than $230 billion for the EV industry between 2009 and 2023, analysis by Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies found.
Subsidies and support from Beijing have been “key players in the rapid growth of China’s EV market”, MingYii Lai, a consultant at Daxue Consulting, told AFP.
That push has seen Chinese car giants like BYD — once known for making batteries — post record annual profits for last year.
In 2023, more than half of all electric vehicles sold worldwide were made by Chinese firms, according to the International Energy Agency.
Much of that was driven by domestic consumption — of all new EVs sold globally in December, 69 percent were in China, according to the research firm Rystad Energy.
But China’s EV giants have made no secret of their overseas ambitions.
BYD has said it hopes to be among the top five car companies in Europe and has plans to open factories in Hungary and Turkey.
Chinese automakers are even making inroads in Latin America — they sold $8.5 billion of cars in the region last year, up from $2.2 billion in 2009, according to the International Trade Center, a UN agency.
And analysts from consulting firm AlixPartners estimate Chinese companies will hold 33 percent of the global car market by 2030.
Washington has sought to boost its own domestic EV market, in July unveiling $1.7 billion in grants to help expand or revive auto facilities for making electric vehicles and parts.
And the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act funnelled some $370 billion into subsidies for America’s energy transition, including tax breaks for US-made EVs and batteries.
