The People’s Republic of China is forging ahead with electric vehicles, despite a slackening of interest elsewhere. Reuters confirms how the Asian giant is taking steps to reduce the risks of fires and explosions in electric vehicle and hybrid batteries. We examine the implications of China tightening battery safety standards at this time. What will this mean for automakers in this vast region?
The Impact of China’s Tighter Battery Safety Rules
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, issued a set of technical standards on April 16, 2025. These apply to both fully electric, and hybrid vehicles sold in China. This is becoming a huge market, which already makes up half of all new car sales in that country.
The new regulations resulting from China tightening battery safety, place a firm duty on electric and hybrid automakers to ensure these two things:
- Their batteries will not catch fire or explode, within a defined time period during specified tests.
- Manufacturers must reduce risks for drivers, passengers and surrounding infrastructure during thermal runaway.
We understand that these new rules passed approval during March 2025, but were held back until now. However, electric and hybrid automakers have to July 2026, to meet them.
More Detail on China’s Revised EV Standards
These new regulations expand an earlier requirement, of a five-minute warning of an EV fire risk. The new requirements include the impact of crashes, and also fast-charging batteries.
Monthly sales of electric and hybrid vehicles in China match, and occasionally exceed those using gasoline. This is running ahead of the 2015 goal to meet the target by 2035, perhaps because of strong support from government.
It’s worth noting that gasoline vehicles have a greater chance of catching fire, than their electric and hybrid vehicle counterparts. There is, however, a need to counter fake social media traffic, in the interests of stemming global warming.
More Information
Thermal Runaway and Personal Safety
