Govt to scrap registration fees for buying electric vehicles: Javadekar

The government is promoting electric vehicles (EV) by proposing to drop registration fees and using the Union Budget to given an additional income tax deduction of Rs 1.5 lakh on interest paid on loans taken to purchase such transport, said Prakash Javadekar, Minister of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises, has said.

Javadekar said his department will spend around Rs 500 crore to set up 2,636 charging stations in 62 cities across cities under the second phase of the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid & Electric Vehicles in India (FAME) scheme. People have purchased about 11,000 EV in the last 10 months by using FAME-II, he said in Rajya Sabha on Tuesday.

As many as 5,595 electrical buses have been sanctioned to various cities for public transport under the second phase of the scheme, which was launched in April 2015. During the first phase, around 2.8 lakh hybrid and electric vehicles were supported by way of demand incentive amounting to about Rs 359 crore.

FAME-II, which started in April 2019, has a total budgetary support of Rs 10,000 crore for a period of three years to support electrification of public and shared transport by providing subsidies to around 7,000 buses, 5 lakh three-wheelers, 550,00 passenger cars and 10 lakh two-wheelers.

Javadekar said Goods and Services Tax (GST) on electric vehicles was reduced from 12 per cent rate to 5 per cent, as against the 28 per cent GST levied on conventional vehicles.

Javadekar rejected claims that the automobile industry was battling slowdown because of government regulations, saying norms were needed for safety, fuel economy and the environment. "The government, as a policymaker, always attempts to keep and improve momentum of the economy through a package of measure through stakeholder consultations for comprehensive and continued development of the auto sector as and when required. Some of the steps taken by the government to counter automotive slowdown," he said.

Dept of Heavy Industries sanctions 2,636 charging stations to support EVs

In order to enhance clean mobility in the road transport sector, the Department of Heavy Industries has sanctioned 2,636 charging stations under the second phase of the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Electric Vehicles in India scheme. With this, the total number of charging stations planned to be installed across select cities has gone up to about 14,000.

Minister of Heavy Industries & Public Enterprises Prakash Javadekar said that in future at least one charging station will be available in most of the select cities in a grid of 4 Km x 4 km. He said this would boost the confidence of electric vehicles users and encourage OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers) to launch the new EV models.

The Department of Heavy Industry had invited Expressions of Interest (EoI) for deploying EV charging infrastructure, from cities with a population of over one million, State/UT capitals, smart cities, and those in special category states.

About 106 proposals from public and private Entities for the deployment of about 7,000 EV charging stations were received.

After evaluation of these proposals as per the EoI, on the advice of the Project Implementation and Sanctioning Committee (PISC), the government sanctioned 2,636 charging stations for 62 cities in 24 states. The proposals were submitted by 19 public entities. Of these 2,636 charging stations, 1,633 will be fast-charging stations and 1,003 will be slow-charging.

The sanction letters to the selected entities will be issued in phases after ensuring the availability of land for charging stations, signing of necessary agreements/MoU with concerned partner organizations like city municipal corporation, Discoms and oil companies. Subsequently, each selected public entities are required to initiate the procurement process in a time-bound manner for deployment of sanctioned charging stations.

Hyundai plans to bring fuel cell cars to India, Nexo could be first launch

Korean auto major Hyundai is planning to bring fuel cell electric vehicles to India. The company has already started a feasibility study as part of the plan.

Hyundai Nexo, which is already available in many markets, could be the first launch. The company claims Nexo is the world's first dedicated hydrogen-powered SUV and that it has a range of close to 380 miles, highest for any fuel-cell or electric vehicle in the market.

S S Kim, Managing Director and CEO, Hyundai Motor India said, "progress for humanity with zero emission mobility is our responsibility and part of the vision to make a long-term positive transformation for our future generations. We have initiated the feasibility study for fuel cell electric vehicle in India and promise to bring the ultimate solution with zero emission mobility".

On Tuesday, Hyundai announced its "Strategy 2025". As a part of it, the company aims to sell 670,000 electric vehicles annually. "The goal is to electrify most new models by 2030 in key markets such as Korea, US, China, and Europe, with emerging markets such as India and Brazil following suit by 2035," the company said in a statement.

Hyundai is the first company to launch a fully electric car - Kona - in India.

UP to buy 600 electric buses, targets 10,000 for public transport by 2024

In order to accelerate its electric vehicles (EV) roadmap, the Yogi Adityanath government will soon float tenders for the supply of 600 electric buses for public transport across major cities in Uttar Pradesh.

The buses are proposed to be deployed in Lucknow, Kanpur, Prayagraj (Allahabad), Agra, Ghaziabad, Varanasi, Mathura, Gorakhpur and Shahjahanpur.

Apart from sourcing electric buses from private companies, the UP urban transport directorate would also facilitate setting up of charging stations and maintenance infrastructure to service the vehicles under the same tendering process.

The government has estimated 200,000 charging stations would be set up across UP in the next few years to cater the growing fleet of public and private EVs.

Chairing a review meeting here Friday, UP urban development minister Ashutosh Tandon directed officials to speedily complete the tendering for 600 electric buses even as he also instructed for replacing existing fleet of buses with new CNG buses.

On August 6, the Adityanath cabinet had cleared the much awaited state EV policy, which is projected to attract private investment to the tune of Rs 40,000 crore over the next 5 years and create nearly 50,000 job opportunities.

“We have envisaged by 2024, nearly 70 per cent of public transport buses in UP would be electric, with about 10,000 new buses being introduced for the purpose,” UP cabinet minister and state government spokesperson Sidharth Nath Singh had told the media after the crucial cabinet meeting.

So far, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Maharashtra had rolled out their EV policies. However, being the largest consumer state, UP is counting on the high growth potential of the sector vis-a-vis peer states.

The new policy promises sops to encourage private investment in the EV space, which is among the topmost priorities of the Centre to promote green transport, cut emissions and pare burgeoning oil import bill.

“The policy focuses on three main planks -- promoting manufacture of EVs in the state, setting up charging stations and generating demand for such vehicles,” Singh said, adding the sector was key to cutting emissions and reducing oil imports.

Under the policy, the state has offered various incentives, including land cost subsidy of 25 per cent, up to Rs 50 lakh subsidy on capital investment (capex) for technology transfers and Rs 25 lakh capex subsidy on charging stations to mega anchor units and ultra mega battery units.

The policy further offers 100 per cent rebate on registration of e-vehicles, apart from 25 per cent rebate on road tax.

Addressing an event in Lucknow on July 28, Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran had observed the Group saw immense potential in UP for renewable energy and EV segments even as he noted UP was the most important state and its success was imperative for achieving the country’s target of becoming $5 trillion economy by 2024.

Nissan, BMW, VW in talks to help South Africa switch to electric vehicles

Nissan Motor Co., BMW AG and Volkswagen AG are among carmakers in talks to bring the electric-car revolution to South Africa, as the nation’s auto-factory floors risk being left behind in the global switch to greener vehicles.

The industry is preparing a unified stance on electrification to present to the government by the end of the year, Mike Mabasa, chief executive officer of the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa, or Naamsa, said in an interview.

Among the goals is persuading lawmakers to reduce or drop a 23 per cent import tariff on electric vehicles to help ramp up nascent domestic sales, he said. Another is to roll out a charging infrastructure in a country where the state-owned power monopoly is in deep financial crisis.

Taking steps to boost the popularity of electric vehicles in South Africa is just one part of the equation. The auto-manufacturing industry makes up about 7per cent of the country’s economy, according to Naamsa. The sector is one of the more positive aspects of an economy expected to grow at less than 1per cent for a second consecutive year.

“The country needs to move forward and bring new technologies,” said Mike Whitfield, Nissan’s chairman for the southern Africa region. “The rest of the world will move very fast and if we don’t get going we will be left behind.”

South Africa has long been a hub for global automaking, attracting plants operated by seven carmakers from Toyota Motor Corp. to Isuzu Motors Ltd. Last year, the manufacturers exported almost 210,000 cars to Europe, where Volkswagen is already retooling factories to only make electric cars. That’s just under a third of all local production and makes up 60per cent of exports.

To date, there are no firm plans for electric-car or hybrid production in South Africa, but the government and industry agreed in 2018 to extend a manufacturing incentive program, creating jobs and enabling models like the BMW X3 sport utility vehicle and Nissan’s Novara pickup to be produced locally.

“The electric-vehicle play in South Africa will not be determined by the South African consumer, but by the requirements of export markets,” Martyn Davies, an auto-industry specialist at Deloitte LLP, said by phone from Johannesburg, adding that the weaker rand is also making exports more attractive.

The quality of the local plants of BMW, Ford Motor Co and Mercedes-Benz AG are good enough to make retooling quite straightforward, he said, adding that the next product made in South Africa by those automakers could feasibly be electric.

Under the terms of the new manufacturing plan, the automakers will have to more than double annual production to as many as 1.4 million vehicles by 2035, and that won’t happen without making electric cars as well as gas or diesel, according to Naamsa’s Mabasa.

BMW’s i3 and i8 are two of only three models currently available in the birth country of electric car pioneer Elon Musk, and only 620 units have been sold. Jaguar Land Rover introduced the I-Pace earlier this year, while Nissan is holding off on the launch of the latest Leaf until after an agreement is reached on import tariffs.

Elsewhere on the African continent, a plan by Volkswagen to introduce an electric-vehicle in Rwanda stands in contrast to a lack of other developments.

Another barrier to an accelerated electric-car boom in South Africa is Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd, the power provider that last week reported an annual loss of almost $1.5 billion and requires an $8.8 billion government bailout over the next three years.

The utility has been forced to implement intermittent rolling blackouts and is reliant on coal, which is out of step with the environmentally friendly advantages of producing electric cars, Mabasa said. Therefore, the industry paper is likely to lay out a mixture of power sources between Eskom and privately owned renewable energy projects, he said.

But the need to turn around Eskom’s financial situation is likely to be of more pressing concern to the government than using it to enable the electric-car industry, Nissan’s Whitfield said.

“There is excess capacity, but quite frankly Eskom’s issues have to be addressed or we will have much bigger problems,” Whitfield said.

Planning to buy e-vehicle? EV firms trim prices after GST breather

Owning an electric car and two-wheeler will now be easier on the wallet. With a steep reduction in the GST (goods and service tax) rate taking effect, manufacturers of EVs have reduced prices of their models — up to Rs 80,000 for e-cars and up to Rs 9,000 for e-two-wheelers.

In a bid to spur the EV demand, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had announced a reduction in GST on EVs from 12 per cent to 5 per cent in her maiden Budget.

Sohinder Gill, director general at Society of Manufacturers of Electric Vehicles (SMEV), said EV makers, which mainly include eight two-wheeler makers, carmakers and three-wheeler makers, have passed on the benefit of the reduced GST rate.

“While it may not have much impact on the demand as the benefit from affordable two-wheelers will only be Rs 4000-5000, it will boost sentiment,” said Gill. Hero Electric, too, has reduced prices across its range, he added.

Tata Motors that sells the electric version of Tigor has reduced prices by up to Rs 80,000 across its variants, with effect from August 1. Tigor EV, which was earlier priced between Rs 12.35 lakh and Rs 12.71 lakh (ex-showroom price in Mumbai) and will now be available to customers between Rs 11.58 lakh and Rs 19.20 lakh.

“In light of the recent announcement made by the government to slash the GST rate for all electric-powered vehicles from 12 per cent to 5 per cent, the price of Tata Motors’ EVs will be reduced by up to Rs 80,000, starting 1 August 2019,” said Shailesh Chandra, president –Electric Mobility Business and Corporate Strategy, Tata Motors, in a statement. These prices, he added, do not include the FAME subsidy and TCS (tax collected at source).

Mahindra Electric, the EV-making arm of Mahindra & Mahindra, also announced price cuts. “Mahindra will pass on the benefits to customers across our entire product range with immediate effect. This tax cut, along with the strong FAME II policy, will see the adaption rate in EV going up drastically with a boost to India’s last- and first-mile mobility,” said Mahesh Babu, CEO Mahindra Electric.

After the reduction, prices of Mahindra eVerito will come down by Rs 80,000 and cost Rs 10.71 lakh (including FAME benefits - on-road in Delhi). The price of Treo three-wheeler will go down by up to Rs 20,000 and will now start at Rs 2.05 lakh (on-road), the company said.

Hero MotoCorp-backed Ather Energy that makes the premium electric scooter also announced a price cut of Rs 9,000 on its flagship model Ather 450. At present, Ather scooters are available in Bengaluru and Chennai. Ather also plans to begin operations in major cities like Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi NCR and Pune, and 30 other cities by 2023, it said in the statement.

India sold close to 126,000 EVs in 2018-19; a majority were two-wheelers. As of now, Mahindra and Tata Motors are the only two companies that sell EVs. Last month, Hyundai Motor India launched the premium electric car offering Kona. Priced at Rs 25 lakh, the company claims to have got an encouraging response to its offering.

Price cuts

Tata Motors

Sells the electric version of Tigor and has reduced prices by up to Rs 80,000 across its variants, with effect from August 1

Mahindra & Mahindra

Prices of eVerito will come down by Rs 80,000 and cost Rs 10.71 lakh (including FAME benefits, on-road in Delhi)

The price of Treo three-wheeler will go down by up to Rs 20,000 and will now start at Rs 2.05 lakh (on-road)

Hero MotoCorp-backed Ather Energy

Premium electric scooter firm also announced a price cut of Rs 9,000 on its flagship model Ather 450

E-scooter start-up Ather Energy plans to go on a global journey

At a time when finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman made a slew of announcements last week to turbocharge the fledgling electric vehicles (EV) industry, smart electric scooter start-up Ather Energy is gearing up to expand to about 50 cities across the country in five years.

It also wants to take its scooters to global markets, including Latin America, Southeast Asia and Europe in the same period.

Backed by marquee investors such as Flipkart co-founder Sachin Bansal, Tiger Global and Hero Motocorp, the company is also looking at other business models such as rental and ride-sharing, leveraging the connectivity features in its scooters. The Bengaluru-based company has already introduced a lease programme for its scooters.

“I am extremely happy with the (Budget) announcement. I don’t think I was going to ask for more,” said Tarun Mehta, co-founder and chief executive of Ather, in an interview. “A product like this has to go global. I think, as companies like ours emerge, there is more of an opportunity to go international rapidly,” said Mehta, whose firm has raised around $100 million from the investors so far.

He said now the government needs to stimulate local production and supply chain. This includes incentives that help not just the original equipment manufacturers but also the supplier ecosystem.

“We can’t afford to get a lot of demands and have no local producers of these vehicles,” he said.

Mehta, who cofounded Ather Energy in 2013 with Swapnil Jain, said he commutes daily on an Ather electric scooter to his office located at a tech park which also houses firms such as Accenture, Byju’s and Swiggy in Bengaluru.

In June last year, Ather opened its flagship product Ather 450 for pre-orders in Bengaluru, while deliveries started in September. The company is now entering an aggressive expansion phase starting with Chennai and eventually expanding to 30 cities by the end of FY23. To meet the projected demand in the coming years, Ather is planning a new manufacturing facility, which will be designed to produce one million vehicles a year.

Infrastructure over incentive to promote electric vehicles: Economic Survey

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). This is because the driving range of batteries in electric vehicles is less, compared to those which run on fossil fuel.

The suggestion by the chief economic advisor comes at a moment when the industry and the government's policy think tank NITI Aayog have expressed conflicting views about the road map. “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 in India, the limited availability of charging infrastructure appeared to be a major impediment to increased adoption of EVs, another being the time taken for completely charging EVs.

However, despite the challenges, the Survey noted that electric vehicles will be the future in India and even said that the country can emerge as a manufacturing hub of EVs with favourable policy support.

India can emerge as a hub of manufacturing of EVs, generating employment and growth opportunities. "It may not be unrealistic to visualise one of the Indian cities emerging as Detroit of EVs in the future," it said. Appropriate policy measures are needed to lower the overall lifetime ownership costs of EVs and make them an attractive alternative to conventional vehicles for all consumers.

NITI Aayog gives scooter, bike makers 2 weeks to draw up EV plan: Report

India’s central think-tank has asked scooter and motorbike manufacturers to draw up a plan to switch to electric vehicles, days after they publicly opposed the government’s proposals saying they would disrupt the sector, two sources told Reuters.

NITI Aayog officials met with executives from companies including Bajaj Auto, Hero MotoCorp and TVS late on Friday, giving them two weeks to come up with the plan, according to one of the executives.

The think-tank, which is chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and plays a key role in policymaking, had recommended that only electric models of scooters and motorbikes with engine capacity of more than 150cc must be sold from 2025, sources have told Reuters.

Automakers opposed the proposal and warned that a sudden transition, at a time when auto sales have slumped to a two-decade low, would cause market disruption and job losses.

India is one of the world’s largest two wheeler markets with sales of more than 20 million scooters and motorbikes last year.

During Friday’s meeting government officials argued that switching to EVs is of national importance so India does not miss out on the global drive towards environmentally cleaner vehicles, one of sources said. But industry executives responded that a premature switch with no established supply chain, charging infrastructure or skilled labour in India, could result in India losing its leadership position in scooters and motorbikes, the second source said.

“There were clearly drawn out positions,” said the source, adding there were “strong opinions” at the meeting.

Here's the real reason why you are still not driving an electric car

It seems every major carmaker these days is thinking about electric vehicles in some capacity. At one of the world’s largest auto shows in Shanghai this year, several manufacturers boasted their snazzy concept cars and talked up imminent launches.

Electric-vehicle sales are rising fast, and battery installation is climbing — largely thanks to China, where battery demand rose more than 175% in the first quarter.

Before getting carried away with images of electric cars racing down roadways and crowding out gas guzzlers, there’s a stark reality to consider: Vehicles that appeal to swathes of consumers remain few and far between, and those on the road are still too expensive.

How, despite all the grand aspirations and investment, can this cost barrier persist? One of the main culprits is battery technology.

Batteries comprise about half the cost of an electric car. While batteries have gotten less expensive over the past few years, they’re still not cheap enough to put the overall cost of a green car on par with a regular one. In China, the average selling price for batteries at the end of last year was close to $180 per kilowatt hours, down 11% from a year earlier but still higher than experts and analysts’ expectations.

Leading battery makers like South Korea’s Samsung SDI Co., SK Innovation Co., LG Chem Ltd., China’s Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. and Japan’s Panasonic Corp. have been pushing toward commercializing next-generation batteries for years.(1) As automakers’ orders rise, these companies have been piling in capital to add capacity as well. Yet the technology isn’t evolving as quickly as anticipated. Operating margins, on average, have been negative, and free cash flows are volatile.

Now all the euphoric expectations are coming back down to earth. Given batteries’ slow development, cars aren’t going as far and can’t be charged as quickly as hoped. 

Analysts are even raising their forecast for batteries’ average selling price by as much 20% in the coming years. That’s despite the prices of materials like cobalt and lithium dropping (albeit from stratospheric levels) because of lackluster demand.

Meanwhile, the chemistry is proving difficult. To make cars go farther, manufacturers have been tinkering with battery composition, trying to increase the ratio of energy-dense nickel in the cathode to 80% from 60%, while reducing the amount of cobalt and manganese.(2) This process is highly sensitive, which is why trying to make these batteries affordable, functional and safe has been elusive. Nickel also tends to get very hot and batteries can catch fire, delaying efforts to make them commercially viable.

This isn’t to say that electric vehicles have stalled. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. analysts estimate that if “solid progress” in battery technology is made then the cost for existing ones can be reduced by 30% to 40% at most. But even that’s unlikely to bring prices to a level at which consumers would “actively purchase” such cars without subsidies, they note.

The hard truth is that, like it or not, environmental regulations in major markets such as China and Europe are forcing carmakers into electric cars at any cost. Stock prices and valuations have dropped sharply over the past year for manufacturers of electric vehicles and their parts. It may be time for investors to accept that the shift to electric will be more gradual than full-throttle.

(1) In theory, these batteries have higher specific energy, or energy per unit mass.

(2) Cathode materials are about a fourth of the battery-cell cost.

Electric drive: Ola bets on two, three-wheelers, says e-cars to take time

Expecting rapid adoption of four-wheeler electric vehicles at a mass scale to take time, ride-hailing firm Ola is betting big on two and three-wheelers for its electric mobility drive, according to a senior company official.

With lessons learnt from its experiment in Nagpur, where the company had partnered with Mahindra & Mahindra in 2017 for a multi-modal electric mass mobility project, Ola believes right now "four-wheelers are not yet ready" for such usage in India on a large scale.

Therefore, the company is now focussing on deploying 10,000 electric vehicles (EVs), a mix of two and three-wheelers, on Indian roads by the end of March 2020.

"The biggest lesson (from Nagpur) was that (electric) four-wheelers are not yet ready. It is going to take a couple of years for the math on four-wheelers to work," Ola Electric Mobility (OEM) co-founder Anand Shah told PTI.

He, however, said the company hasn't given up as it is confident that electrification is viable in the long run.

Sharing the company's road map for electric mobility, Shah said, "In our view, we are putting our bets on three-wheelers and two-wheelers in the coming year. It is absolutely fair to say that after the learnings from Nagpur experience, our focus will be on two and three-wheelers first in terms of EVs."

Right now in the EV market in India, he said it is mostly in three-wheelers, with E-rickshaws being "the largest population of EVs by natural adoption".

Further, he said, "We think two-wheelers are also emerging very quickly, partially because of policy and also because of the rising interest in commercial use of two-wheelers, whether that is in deliveries for our own food business or any of our competitors, e-commerce companies or scooter sharing."

OEM has already started pilots with a fleet of a hundreds of three-wheelers in Gurugram.

"We are expecting to put 10,000 EVs, a mix of two and three-wheelers, on the road by the end of March 2020. We are very committed to make it happen," he said adding the company was are looking to deploy these in whichever viable pockets of the country that were willing to work with it.

Delhi, Maharashtra, Kerala, Karnataka, Telangana, AP and Gujarat could be some of the places, he said.

Reiterating that Ola is still "actively working on electric four-wheelers", he said, "We are testing electric cars. We have tried every electric car that exists in India today, but we think it's going to take some time for rapid four-wheeler EV adoption at scale."

On investments for electric mobility, Shah said, "We have raised Rs 400 crore from some of our early investors -- Tiger Global Management, Matrix India. That money will be spent on meeting these milestones, on getting the technology right, getting the business model right and we will keep growing from there."

Elaborating on the experience from the Nagpur project, he said,"There needs to be more four-wheeler EVs, when we started in Nagpur there was literally only one make of electric car available in the market."

Besides, he said there has to be appropriate battery technology for Indian conditions and usage along with a proper understanding of infrastructure utilisation to strike balance between usage of land, power and time of the day.

Shah further said electricity cost is also a very significant input although now the government is beginning to address this.

How rampant theft of electricity could drain India's electric car hopes

Dirty air has finally become an issue in Indian election manifestos, along with perennial subjects such as temple-building and farmers’ incomes.

That shouldn’t be a surprise: Even politicians can’t escape air pollution, which has reduced life expectancy in areas near the capital New Delhi by more than 12 years.

To address the issue, the government earlier this year laid out a three-year subsidy program for electric vehicles valued at about $1.4 billion — about 10 times larger than a previous plan. There’s just one flaw in this impressive-looking commitment to putting more clean-energy vehicles on the roads: It’s likely to exacerbate rampant theft of electricity.

India is home to over 2 million electric two-wheelers and rickshaws — more than the number of electric cars in China. Sales of such smaller electric vehicles continue to rise. But in the absence of charging infrastructure, many of their drivers have been illegally siphoning power. Only 10 per cent of the latest subsidy program is allocated for charging stations.

More than a quarter of all the power India generates is either pilfered for various purposes or lost in transmission, according to figures cited in local media as of mid-2018. The power sector loses more than $16 billion a year to theft — more than any other country in the world.

Power stolen to charge three-wheeler rickshaws costs more than $20 million a year in Delhi alone. There are 100,000 such vehicles on the capital’s roads, and only a quarter are registered. Losses for state electricity retailers rose more than 60 per cent in the first nine months of the fiscal year through December.

The lack of charging infrastructure has also contributed to puny demand for green passenger cars. Mahindra Electric, a unit of automaker Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd., discontinued production of its first electric car this month. Maruti Suzuki India Ltd., the country’s largest carmaker, only recently started making electric vehicles.

Notwithstanding, the government keeps setting itself big goals. Two years ago, India’s plan envisaged a “transformative” target of making all three-wheeler vehicles electric by 2030. Even under a business-as-usual scenario, it expected 40 per cent of personal passenger cars to be battery-electric by then, from zero in 2015. In a report this month, a government planning body lauded the latest subsidy program and said it had the potential to boost penetration rates for electric-vehicle sales to 30 per cent for passenger cars, 70 per cent for commercial cars, 40 per cent for buses and 80 per cent for two- and three-wheelers by 2030.

Compare those goals with other countries’ targets and India’s start to look even more unrealistic: China, the world’s largest electric-car market, has been at it for a decade and is still targeting only 20 per cent of total sales to be electric or hybrid by 2025.

Here’s the reality: Just having a green subsidy program in place is no longer enough. Sure, it’s a step in the right direction, but as China and other countries are realizing, incentives have to be targeted, adequate and suited to the country’s situation.

Assuming a moderate level of adoption, India needs about $6 billion for charging infrastructure, $4 billion in incentives and a further $7 billion to build out battery capacity, according to estimates by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. That’s a far cry from the enlarged $1.4 billion outlay, with its $140 million for charging. The latest subsidy plan focuses mainly on public transport for rickshaws, cars and buses, and on two-wheelers only for personal usage. That means most of the burden for providing charging stations still falls on the government for now — not home-chargers.

The power-generation capacity just isn’t there to support such a program. Even the highest-income neighborhoods of Delhi have to contend with electricity cuts, let alone rural and lower-income areas. A target of installing almost 3,000 charging stations in major cities and at intervals of 25 kilometers on major highways, as the plan stipulates, seems far-fetched.

Election promises are easy to make on paper. If India’s politicians want to make the air breathable again, they need to give drivers somewhere to plug in.

Globally, most experts agree that pushing electrification will need government subsidies, as has happened in Scandinavian countries and in China.

Ministries, PSUs, power firms gear up to charge India's electric vehicles

At least half a dozen public sector firms, Indian Railways and various ministries are in the process of creating infrastructure and manufacturing components for electric vehicles to support the government's vision in the electric mobility space. While many are looking to diversify, the main focus is to tap into the Rs 42,000 crore market by 2030.

Significant investment is being mobilised by public and private sectors to manufacture and install electric vehicle supply equipment (EVSE) infrastructure across India. This includes charging and battery swapping technologies, says Niti Aayog. Both charging and swapping solutions are supported by business model innovation that enable high utilisation of infrastructure. Plans are underway to fuel EVs with clean power, with industry players exploring solar-plus-EV technology in Mumbai.

Indian Railways has decided to allocate space for electric vehicle charging stations at their station parking lots along with private sector participation.

BSES Rajdhani Power Limited (BRPL), a JV of Reliance Infrastructure Ltd and Government of NCT of Delhi, plans to convert its entire service delivery fleet into an electric one by 2030. BRPL is also investing in testing models for its facilities to support stabilising the electricity grid for EV charging, as well as pilots for how to effectively integrate renewable electricity (RE) into its grid network.

Indian Oil Corporation has partnered with clean energy firm Fortum India for EV charging stations and started with Nagpur, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Delhi. The company also signed MoUS with NTPC, Powergrid and Rajasthan Electric to install EV charging stations in various cities. The public sector firm also said that on the avail is a next generation energy storage product to cater to EVs. The idea is to go beyond lithium ion batteries in view of their limitations.

HPCL and others have said that they will be setting up charging stations across networks and tied up with Tata Power to create the infrastructure.

National Aluminium Company (Nalco) is planning to set up a production line for lithium ion cells. The company has signed a pact with Indian Space Research Organization (Isro) for transfer of lithium ion technology. India imported lithium ion batteries worth $150 million in 2017.

As part of its diversification initiative, BHEL has been expanding its footprint in the e-mobility business. Notably, the company has already installed DC chargers at Udyog Bhawan in New Delhi. BHEL is also executing another commercial order for installing DC chargers across various locations in the country.

BHEL is extending its offering in the e-mobility segment and will manufacture EV chargers, electric buses and related critical components. As part of the 'Make in India' initiative of the Government of India, in-house development of EV motors, propulsion systems and fast chargers have also been undertaken by the company, said the company's spokesperson.

Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL), an energy service company of GoI has ventured into demand aggregation for EVs, which could help develop better charging infrastructure and kick off the EV ecosystem in India. However, deliveries under EESL’s first tender for 10,000 vehicles has been delayed. EESL has pushed the deadline of rolloing out electric vehicles to September 2019.

Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) has released an amendment of building code and town planning rules for provisioning of EV charging stations in private and commercial buildings.

India is currently stepping up action and ambition on EVs. Centre has pledged to ensure 30 per cent of all vehicles on the road are electric by 2030. The national budget 2019-20 announcements included an outlay of Rs 10,000 crore for Phase 2 of the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and Electric Vehicles (FAME) scheme to boost electric mobility and increase the number of electric vehicles in commercial fleets.

Fortum to power India's electric vehicles, plans 700 charging points

Fortum, one of the world's leading clean energy companies, is eyeing a signal role in powering a wide fleet of electric vehicles (EVs) on Indian roads.

With a dominant presence in Nordic countries and the Baltic region, Russia and Poland, Fortum is looking to deepen presence in India by building on its network of charging points for EVs. Fortum India which has already operationalized 36 direct current (DC), unmanned points in the suburbs of Hyderabad and Mumbai, is aiming to ramp up this network to 700 by 2020.

“We are constantly evaluating the Indian market for charging infrastructure. On our radar are the advanced cities with higher per capita incomes and people with greater disposable incomes. So, in addition to Hyderabad and Mumbai, we are looking at cities like Delhi, Chennai, Bengaluru, Chandigarh and Pune”, said Awadesh Jha, vice president (charge & drive and sustainability), Fortum India.

He refused to share figures on investments already sunk in or those in the pipeline.

Fortum is among the pioneers in EV charging. It boasts of 3000 smart chargers in Nordic countries, thirty per cent of them being DC quick chargers. 

 Beginning with a pilot in October 2017, Fortum marked its foray into the EV charging market in India. Before setting off on the EV charging business, Fortum started its India activity in 2012 with the takeover of 5 Mw solar power project in Rajasthan. It has grown staggeringly since then with a portfolio of 685 Mw solar power projects- 185 Mw operative and the residual 500 Mw under implementation.

Fortum has also forged a joint venture with Numaligarh Refinery Ltd along with Chempolis for installing a bio-refinery plant. “We intend to manufacture ethanol from bamboo. To cut down on emissions, the government has plans to blend a certain percentage of ethanol with petrol and diesel”, Jha said.

Turning to EVs, he said, the Indian market offers immense possibilities with Tata and Mahindra already rolling out their models. “In India, the EVs unveiled so far are low voltage vehicles as opposed to Europe and Japan where the vehicles need higher capacity charging. Towards the middle of this year, we are expecting more EV launches from the higher end OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers)”.

According to Jha, the EV charging ecosystem in India is dotted with numerous players but the space is headed for consolidation in the long term along the lines of the telecom sector.

“India is a market where competition is huge. But we are not looking at competition, our thrust is on collaboration”, he added.

He feels the Government of India's second phase of Faster Adoption & Manufacturing of Electric & Hybrid Vehicles (FAME) will give an impetus to e-mobility.

“It is a welcome step to see the focus on creating charging infrastructure for enabling adoption of e-mobility. Though details of modalities of scheme is not known, we expect that private charge point operators will get the opportunity to participate in creating charging infrastructure through this scheme. Additionally, FAME-II has provided support for vehicles fitted with Li-ion based battery that have the potential to scale up particularly for high performance and high range vehicles”, said Jha.