BEIJING. Forty-electric taxis and cruise the streets of Shenzhen, a city of Guangdong province (southern China), from Monday, making it, according to the president of Shenzhen Bus Group (SBG), Hu Jianping, the first city China to put into service these environmentally friendly vehicles. The vehicles, called E6 and manufactured by the Chinese company BYD, can accommodate five people, reach a top speed of 140 kilometers per hour, 21. 5 kWh of energy consumed per 100 kilometers and have the ability to travel 300 kilometers from the battery is charged until it is exhausted. "The E6 batteries produce no emissions and do not harm the environment," said Wang Chuanfu, executive director of BYD, picked as the official news agency Xinhua. The 40 electric bike hub motors taxis hit the market for 273,148 yuan (40,000 dólares/32, 426 euros), through the company Pengcheng electric bike hub motors Taxi Co. , Ltd, a joint venture of BYD and SBG. BYD planned to end next June on the roads of a hundred E6 Shenzhen and start selling these taxis to the United States later this year and Europe in February 2011. According to the expert Yonghe Huang, Chinese Center for Automotive Research and Technology, if the electric bike hub motors taxis were used throughout China, city air would be cleaner. The Chinese government hopes to have occurred by 2012 half a million electric bike hub motors vehicles in an attempt to compete with countries with advanced engine technologies and to combat environmental pollution that affects many of the cities of the country. . . .