China adopted stricter auto emission standards equivalent to Euro II on Thursday in order to force polluters off the road, the State Environment Protection Administration (SEPA) announced Thursday in Beijing.  

The new standards require a 30.4 percent cut in CO and a 55.8 reduction in HC and NO from the Euro I standards currently in place, said SEPA Vice Director Wang Jirong.

Traffic enforcement departments will not register new motor vehicles failing to meet Euro II requirements. Manufacturing, sales and export of Euro I vehicles will be forbidden within one year.

Adopting Euro I standards in 2000, Chinese manufacturers abandoned models without exhaust cleaning equipment and jumped to Euro I designs.

The government made the Euro II standards public in 2001 and promised a 30 percent cut in excise taxes on qualified models. So far, 8,953 models have met the standards. Shanghai and Beijing adopted them in 2003, ahead of the rest of the country.

"Euro II marks a new epoch in China's efforts to reduce auto emission, but it is never the end of the road," Wang said, adding that SEPA has developed new Euro III-equivalent standards and will adopt them nationwide in 2008.

(Xinhua News Agency July 2, 2004)