The streets of Beijing have changed dramatically within just a few years. The noisy, smelly thrum of traffic has been replaced by an unusual quiet for a megacity. Roads course with a stream of mostly electric vehicles, all with their distinct, green license plates.
This is not just a Beijing phenomenon. For those arriving in many of China’s major cities from countries dominated by gas-guzzlers, the quiet will be their first impression, said Li Shuo, director of the China climate hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute.
It’s like stepping into the future, he told CNN.
By any measure, China’s EV growth has been extraordinary. More than half of new cars sold are electric, putting the world’s largest automarket on a path to all but erase gas-powered cars over the coming decades. Last year, China’s EV sales soared to 11 million, a nearly 40% increase on 2023, according to data from UK research firm Rho Motion. It’s an “irreversible transformation,” Shuo said.
Maybe (as in I would have to check, not that I think it likely) at highway speeds. But in any low speed area, vehicles without gas engines can be sneaky.
My company was working on an electric bus and I saw a driver sneak up on an engineer with the aforementioned city bus. They actually, legally (in some places) need noise makers at low speeds to deal with this.
The crossover point is 30 km/h. At typical road speeds - not just highway speeds - tire noise dominates.