Hybrid cars

I refer to Motoring (January 31) in which 'Footdown' questions why no tax incentives are provided to encourage the use of hybrid vehicles in Hong Kong.

The government has been monitoring closely the development of environmentally friendly motor vehicle technologies so that appropriate policies can be formulated at an opportune time to promote the use of environmentally cleaner vehicles.

Among the new motor vehicle technologies being developed, petrol-electric hybrid saloon cars are relatively more mature products. However, there are currently very few makes and models of such vehicles available in the world market. In the local market at present, only one model of petrol-electric hybrid saloon is being supplied by one motor vehicle agent.

Apart from the limited choices available, the emission performance and energy efficiency of this type of vehicle also varies greatly. Some do not have any significant advantage over the newer models of conventional engines.

When we consider providing incentives to encourage the use of environmentally cleaner vehicles, we must also take due account of cost-effectiveness.

In terms of emissions, diesel vehicles, although making up only a quarter of the motor vehicle population in Hong Kong, contribute over 90 per cent of the particulates and over 70 per cent of the nitrogen oxides emitted by all motor vehicles in the urban area. By way of comparison, although petrol saloon cars make up two-thirds of Hong Kong's entire motor vehicle fleet, their shares of the particulate and nitrogen oxide emissions are less than 10 per cent and 20 per cent respectively.