Economic Survey 2019: Charging infrastructure, not incentives, key to electric vehicle growth
Another major impediment to the adoption of EVs was the time taken for completely charging EVs, the Survey said.
The Economic Survey has quoted studies showing that more than incentives offered to manufacturers and users, good charging infrastructure is key to mass adoption of electric vehicles (EVs). That is because the driving range of batteries in an electric vehicle is lower, compared to those which run on fossil fuel.
“We find that the market share of EVs is positively related to the availability of chargers and larger availability of chargers corresponds to greater adoption of EVs. The market share of EVs increases with the increasing availability of charging infrastructure,” the Survey said.
It said that in India, the limited availability of charging infrastructure appeared to be a major impediment to increased adoption of EVs.
Another major impediment to the adoption of EVs was the time taken for completely charging EVs, the Survey said.
“Even fast chargers can take around half an hour to charge an electric car while slow chargers could take even 8 hours. It is, therefore, an important policy issue to come up with universal charging standards for the country as a whole to enable increased investment in the creation of such infrastructure,” the Survey said.
Also, since the battery is the heart of any EV, development of appropriate battery technologies that can function efficiently in the high-temperature conditions in India need to be given utmost importance,” the Survey said.
A steering committee headed by NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant has prepared a blueprint for the rollout of electric vehicles in a phased manner, and for setting up of battery manufacturing factories.
Under the plan, all three-wheelers and all two-wheelers below 150cc will need to go electric by 2023 and 2025, respectively.
Source : moneycontrol
