(Yicai Global) Oct. 13 -- More than 70 percent of vehicles made in Shanghai will be equipped with Level 3 self-driving technology, equal to ‘automatic assisted driving,’ by 2025, when the city also aims to produce over 1.2 million new energy vehicles, according to a city government official.

At least three Shanghai car brands producing more than 10 popular products will also be created by 2025, boosting the local car industry’s value to CNY500 billion (USD69.6 billion), Tang Wenkan, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization said at a press conference today. L4 vehicles, those capable of highly autonomous driving, will be used in logistics, environmental sanitation, and passenger transport, he added.

The goal Tang set out was a little more ambitious than the plan the city government published early last month, which calls for Shanghai to initially build China's leading innovation and development system for smart connected vehicles by 2025, with 70 percent of new cars equipped with L2 and L3 self-driving systems, the industry’s value reaching CNY500 billion, and the use of L4 restricted to particular areas and scenarios.

China’s first national standards for grading autonomous driving came into effect in March. The Taxonomy of Driving Automation for Vehicles defines six levels: L0, emergency assistance; L1, partial driving assistance; L2, integrated driving assistance; L3, conditional autonomous driving; L4, highly autonomous driving; and L5, fully autonomous driving. L2 is widely used, with adaptive cruising, lane keeping, and self-parking functions standard in most mainstream NEV models.

Across Shanghai, 1,299 kilometers of roads are open for testing smart connected vehicles, Tang noted, adding that 110 km of roads capable of vehicle-road synergy have been finished, with another 280 km to be added in the near future. In some key areas, the vehicle-road synergy rate of main roads will reach 100 percent, he said.

Shanghai will also strive to build more than 10 application scenarios featuring coordination between vehicle, road, network, and cloud, including unmanned buses and unmanned deliveries, Tang said. Moreover, the city will release local standards and specifications to advance the realization of commercial pilot operations for highly autonomous smart cars in specific scenarios, with the gradual achievement of unmanned driving commercial operation in some areas, he noted.

Tang also set a target for the city’s NEV production. Shanghai will go all out to reach annual output of 1.2 million units by 2025. It produced 631,900 last year, according to official data.

Shanghai became the world’s largest NEV market after the total number of new energy vehicles registered in the city hit 677,000 at the end of 2021.

Shanghai has set several targets for the promotion of NEVs, Tang said. By 2025, all-electric cars will account for over half of the number of new vehicles bought by residents, and over 80 percent of all the city's buses and taxis will likely use alternative energy. In addition, hydrogen is expected to power 10,000 buses and sanitation vehicles.

Regarding infrastructure construction, the scale and quality of charging and battery swap facilities will continue to increase, and their services to improve, Tang added. Some 760,000 charging piles and 300 battery swap stations are set to be completed by 2025.

Shanghai also will front-load construction of hydrogen stations so that more than 70 of them will be operational by 2025 to ensure the full coverage of key application regions within the city, Tang noted.

Editor: Futura Costaglione