15,000 charging stations to roll out in India

In India, the EV charging infrastructure company Evre and parking solutions brand Park+ have announced their partnership to install 10,000 EV charging stations within two years. In a separate deal, the state-owned Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPCL) plans to commission 5,000 electric vehicle charging stations over the next three years.

Firstly to the larger of the two rollouts, Evre. For the planned 10,000 charging stations, the long-term partnership with Park+ will include the acquisition of spaces for smart charging and parking hubs for both the logistics and people mobility segments.

Evre will be responsible for the EV charging infrastructure, while Park+ will be dealing with the real estate aspect of the hubs. Park+ is already operating charging facilities in 1000+ apartments, 250+ corporate, and 30+ malls. The plan is to establish stations will be established across high-demand areas like shopping complexes, residential townships, malls, hotels and corporate tech parks helping in higher utilisation of the EV chargers. In phases, 300 charging hubs will be installed in Delhi NCR by the end of the year, 100 in Bengaluru and 100 in Mumbai and Pune.

In another separate infrastructure move, the Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) said last week that they plan to commission 5,000 electric vehicle charging stations over the next three years. HPCL currently operates just 84 EV charging stations. Here, HPCL has made agreements with Convergence Energy Services Ltd (CESL), Tata Power and Magenta EV Systems for setting up charging infrastructure at their retail outlets.

In March, HPCL launched its own charger in collaboration with Magenta EV Systems. The charger is meant to be incorporated in streetlamps for curbside charging. The state energy company also intends to upgrade infrastructure to address the battery charging needs of two and three-wheelers, which are far more common than cars in the personal mobility segment. Charging stations will be installed at select retail outlets in Mumbai, Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Kolkata, and Pune, with a relatively loose promise of the next 10 years.

HPCL says it is also actively reviewing green hydrogen opportunities for which it has envisaged a capital expenditure of about ₹65,000 crore (around 7.5 billion euros) over the next five years for various projects.

These infrastructure investments follow the Indian government’s push to increase the uptake of EVs and domestic production. Last week, India’s cabinet approved an incentive scheme of about 260 billion rupees ($3.5Bn or €3Bn) over a five-year period. The aim is to boost the production of battery-electric and hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles and to promote the manufacture of drones. The world’s second-most populous country also looks like it might be loosening famously high import taxes on foreign-made electric vehicles. Two government representatives suggested there could be a “sharp” reduction in import duties.

financialexpress.com (Evre), livemint.com (HPCL)