The new car will hydrogen fuel cell-powered, said Lawrence Burns, GM's vice president of R&D and planning.

GM released the E-flex series Volt car earlier this year during the North American auto show.

The Volt concept car uses a combination of electricity and a combustion engine.

Burns said the cars are in production engineering and could reach consumers in three to four years.

He added China will be a major market for the fuel cell vehicle.

Some of the research for the new cars was done with GM's joint venture with Shanghai Automotive Industry Corp, Burns said.

GM sold 291,588 vehicles in China in the first quarter, up 25.0 pct year-on-year.