Deputy Mayor Ai Baojun announced that at the Eighth Annual China Automotive Industry Forum held by the China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) on Oct. 23.

New-energy autos will get more orders from the government and public procurement. By 2012, new-energy cars and new-energy buses will account for more than 30 percent of newly-purchased vehicles by the government and public agencies.

Shanghai will also see a market scale of 20,000 new-energy passenger cars before 2012. To realize this goal, Ai said that Shanghai is formulating a layout plan for electric vehicle infrastructure and will support related enterprises to build charging stations in the future. He also noted that Shanghai will build an infrastructure system before 2012 to provide support for 20,000 electric vehicles.

Moreover, according to Shanghai's regional planning, an industrial base for new-energy vehicles and key parts will be built in Jiading District, and a demonstration base for 30,000 new-energy vehicles will also come into being before 2015.

Pudong and Jinshan Districts will be built into production bases for new-energy passenger cars, while Minhang, Songjiang and other districts will become bases for new-energy commercial vehicles. Jiading has started preparations for the preliminary work.

"Jiading will adopt innovative ways of promoting electric vehicle consumption by promoting commercial rental, group purchases by governmental institutions and private purchases as well as encouraging governmental units to make initial purchases and place orders," said Sun Jiwei, head of Jiading District.

The number of new-energy vehicles in service in Jiading will grow each year from 100 to 3,500 and finally 14,000 units from 2010 to 2012, and they will account for 60 to 70 percent of all electric vehicles sold in Shanghai under the governmental promotion plan, Sun said

Jiading will build 13,000 electric vehicle charging poles and 15 charging stations over the next three years and offer certain amounts of subsidies to the construction projects.

Rong Wenwei, general manager of Shanghai International Automobile City, said that Shanghai will also unveil its fiscal subsidy plan soon, under which each electric vehicle is expected to be entitled to a maximum 40,000-yuan subsidy.

"We have many innovative ways, such as offering homebuyers electric cars, in which we hope the real estate development projects may help boost the sales of new electric cars," Sun said.

Sun added that as Jiading is in the process of urbanization, the development of many real estate projects and the construction of charging posts are both underway.

Rong said that Volvo will localize its production in Jiading and is currently making final reviews on the car models to be introduced. The first car model is most likely to be the Volvo C30 plug-in hybrid.

"I think Volvo will have to introduce new-energy vehicles to Jiading so that it can adapt to the Shanghai market where the costs of labor, land and infrastructure are all already very high," Rong said.