(Yicai) Dec. 6 -- The Hainan government has denied rumors that China’s southernmost province plans to levy road maintenance charges on new energy vehicles, a topic that is gaining importance as NEV adoption grows nationwide and discussions about road funding become more pressing.

“We have never issued any policies related to imposing road maintenance fees on NEVs,” a provincial government official told Yicai yesterday.

Online claims about such fees are the personal opinions of netizens and not the official stance of the Hainan government, the person added, noting that the matter has been reported to the police.

According to other online rumors, Hainan plans to use China's homegrown Beidou satellite navigation system to charge each vehicle a different fee based on the number of miles driven.

Hainan was the first province in China to propose a 2030 ban on sales of fossil-fuel vehicles. More than half of all new cars in the island province are new energy vehicles, giving it one of the highest NEV adoption rates in the country.

To support the NEV industry’s development, China implemented various tax and fee incentives for buyers, such as exempting them from the 10 percent purchase tax. Moreover, NEV buyers do not need to pay fuel tax, which includes road repair charges.

As China's road network continues to grow, funding shortages for maintenance have become increasingly apparent, raising the question of whether NEVs should be subject to repair charges.

There are already more than 24.7 million new NEVs in China, accounting for almost 7.2 percent of the total number of vehicles, according to the Ministry of Public Security.

NEV sales soared nearly 50 percent to 1.43 million units in October from a year earlier to set a new record high, per the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. They accounted for more than 46.8 percent of all new car sales that month.

Editor: Futura Costaglione