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Following is a question by the Hon Lau Kong-wah and a written reply by the Secretary for the Environment, Transport and Works, Dr Sarah Liao, at the Legislative Council meeting today (March 22) :
Question:
With regard to promoting the use of electric vehicles, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) of the number of electric vehicles first registered in each of the past three years, and the total number of registered electric vehicles at present;
(b) whether the percentage of electric vehicles among all vehicles in Hong Kong is lower than those in major cities of Europe and America; if so, of the reasons for that; and
(c) apart from exempting the payment of first registration tax, of the measures to encourage the public to switch to electric vehicles, and whether there is any publicity in this respect?
Reply:
Madam President,
According to the Transport Department, the annual number of electric vehicles first registered in Hong Kong for 2003, 2004 and 2005 is three, eight and eight respectively. The total number of registered electric vehicles as at the end of February 2006 is 72.
Electric vehicles account for about 0.012 per cent of the total number of vehicles in Hong Kong. The percentage of electric vehicles among all vehicles in the United States is about 0.011 per cent, which is similar to that of Hong Kong.
To encourage the use of electric vehicles, the Government has exempted the first registration tax for such vehicles since April 1, 1994. In the 2006-07 Budget, the Government again proposed to extend the concession for another three years until March 31, 2009.
Under an incentive scheme implemented during August 2002 and the end of 2005, the Government also offered the owners of electric public light buses (PLBs) a one-off grant of $80,000 for each PLB. As an electric PLB can only travel 30km to 50km each time after recharging, the trade is not entirely receptive to its performance and reliability. Therefore, no PLB owner has replaced diesel PLB with electric model so far.
We will closely follow the technological development of electric vehicles and will explore ways to promote them further when the technology has improved.
Ends/Wednesday, March 22, 2006
Issued at HKT 12:35
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