this post was submitted on 12 Jun 2024
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The EU will impose additional tariffs of 17.4% to 38.1% on electric cars produced in China, the European Commission announced on Wednesday (12 June), as preliminary results from its anti-subsidy investigation confirmed prices are being distorted by Chinese state support.

The value chain of Chinese electric cars “benefits from unfair subsidisation, which is causing a threat of economic injury to EU battery electric vehicles producers,” EU Commission Vice-President Margaritis Schinas said on Wednesday (12 June).

“When our partners breach the rules, we will assert our rights,” Executive Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis said in a statement.

“Today we have reached a milestone in our anti-subsidy investigation,” he said, adding that “this is based on clear evidence of our extensive investigation and in full respect of WTO rules.”

Duties will differ per carmaker, with Chinese state-owned manufacturer SAIC facing the highest duty at 38.1%, Chinese Geely to face 20% and BYD 17.4%.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (2 children)

The point with EVs being over 45k is mostly the extremely pricey battery, China just subsidized until their cars are at a better price, the EU wants to protect European car manufacturers, that’s that.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

"Subsidized until their cars are at a better price"

What do you think subsidies are? Do you think China is paying $10k for each export sale? Do you think China is just hemorrhaging money so that they can bump sales numbers up?

China dumped billions of dollars into a domestic fast charging network that aggressively stimulated domestic demand and dumped billions of dollars into clean energy initiatives to make sure that electricity prices hover around 1RMB/kWh ($0.14/kWh). How much is electricity in Europe? How much is it in the US?

China offered $1750 in purchase-side tax incentives that have since been phased out. How much are the American purchase-side tax incentives passed by the IRA? Are they still ongoing?

Shanghai gave Tesla hundreds of millions in low-interest loans to set up a factory in Shanghai as opposed to, say, Jiangsu, in exchange for billions of dollars in investment. How much did Tesla's Nevada Gigafactory receive in subsidies?

Plus, let's take a look at who's actually exporting cars to Europe:

MG (SAIC), Volvo (Geely), Tesla, and European joint ventures (BMW, Renault, Volkswagen, etc.)

China has been subsidizing the infrastructure for EVs, absolutely, but subsidizing infrastructure is not illegal. If Europe wants to protect its domestic car manufacturers, the first thing it should look at is Tesla. There's also a reason BMW, Volkswagen, and Mercedes oppose tariffs: these risk retaliation against their currently rather unfettered access to the highly profitable, rapidly growing premium car market in China. They're seeing upwards of 10% YoY growth in their luxury car lineups.

The EU Commission is stabbing itself in the chest to save its face. von der Leyen is pursuing a personal vendetta against the best interests of German automakers, completely forgetting the fact that while 10% of Chinese car production is exported, about 70% of German car production is exported. Meanwhile, while Chinese cars predominantly target the lower end of the market, German cars for export are overwhelmingly premium and luxury vehicles. Just an insane policy that seems to be more political pandering than anything else.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Battery prices are now close to $100 per kWh and are predicted to keep dropping.

https://www.goldmansachs.com/intelligence/pages/electric-vehicle-battery-prices-falling.html

That's $7k for the 60-70kWh battery we see in lots of cars. That's offset against an engine that has multiple hundreds of moving parts, also worth several thousand.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

The engine has hundreds of parts but really only a couple of them are moving. That's the beauty of electric motors.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago (1 children)

They're comparing against the price of an ICE engine and the fact that they don't contain one to offset the cost.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 months ago (1 children)

But they do have an expensive electric motor instead of the ICE, plus an expensive battery.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Electric motors are substantially cheaper (and simpler, and lighter) than internal combustion. Hell, the typical ICE has two electric motors already in it! (starter, alternator)

[–] [email protected] -1 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Electric motors are substantially cheaper (and simpler, and lighter) than internal combustion

Not really. There is a lot of metal - wires - in the electric motor. Retail prices on motors is a lot higher than the retail price on an ICE. https://www.grainger.com/product/WEG-IEEE-841-Motor-250-HP-15G092 is a 250 horse power motor for $30k. https://www.jegs.com/i/Chevrolet-Performance/809/19435110/10002/-1 is a 500 horsepower ICE (I think this is new, but the site also sells rebuilt engines) for $7k.

Of course with motors there are a number of different ways to built them at different costs. However they are not cheaper than an ICE and we shouldn't expect that they would be as there is a lot of metal in a motor.

the typical ICE has two electric motors already in it! (starter, alternator)

Sure, but they are small, neither one is capable of moving your car down the road at full speed (the starter might do it for 10 seconds but then it will overheat)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

A motor basically consists of copper wire and magnets neither of which are expensive materials.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

An engine mostly consists of iron and aluminum which is much cheaper than copper. (cars makers are looking at if they can use aluminum wires in their motors - I'm not sure on status of that)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Yes with hundreds or thousands of parts that all need to be cast or machined to tolerances as tight as a few thousandths of an inch. Electric motors just need copper wire wrapped around in circles and a shaft with magnets attached to it. It's very basic. I get that you want to be right but you're not going to win the argument that electric motors are more expensive or costly to produce than an internal combustion engine.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

You have whole (electric) cars for 30k, that price is laughable. Here you have 220kw (300HP) motor, inverter and differential for 3.5k euros: https://eveurope.eu/en/product/tesla-model-s-drive-train-220-kw-2/

The price difference between a single motor VS dual motor on most cars it's also around 5k, including extra cables, installation, etc.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

I can't find any source for the type of motor used in electric cars - which presumably will be made in larger quantities bringing costs down.