The Ministry of Power, which had revised consolidated guidelines and standards for electric vehicle charging infrastructure on January 14, 2022, said that the number of charging stations has more than doubled in nine mega cities – Surat, Pune, Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai and Chennai – in the last four months.

• The nine mega cities have added 678 new public EV chargers since October
• Almost 2 lakh EVs have been added in the last four months
• Oil Marketing Companies have announced setting up 22,000 EV charging stations

The ministry said that it has undertaken multiple initiatives to promote the manufacturing and adoption of electric vehicles in the country. It has made 360-degree efforts to enhance public charging infrastructure by involving private and public agencies (BEE, EESL, PGCIL and NTPC, among others), the ministry added.

The MoP has stated that charging stations should be in an area of 3x3km grid. At present, India has a total of 1,640 operational public EV chargers, of which the aforementioned nine cities account for approximately 940 stations.

Between October 2021 and January 2022, 678 public EV charging stations were installed in these nine cities, which is about 2.5 times the earlier numbers; and, during the same period, about 1,80,000 new electric vehicles have been bought.

Recently, the Ministry of Power revised these guidelines and standards with the following amendments:

• To provide an affordable tariff chargeable by public EV charging station operators and owners and EV owners.
• Enable EV owners to charge their vehicles at their residences or offices using their existing electricity connections.
• A revenue sharing model has been suggested for land use to make public charging stations financially viable from an operational perspective.
• Timelines have been prescribed for providing connectivity to the Public Charging Station (PCS) for faster rollout of public EV charging.
• Technical requirements for public charging stations have been elaborated.

Furthermore, oil marketing companies have also announced setting up of 22,000 EV charging stations in prominent cities and on national highways across the country. Out of these, 10,000 will be installed by Indian Oil, 7,000 by Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL), and the rest will be installed by Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPCL).

IOCL already installed 439 EV charging stations and plans to install another 2,000 EV charging stations over the next year. BPCL has installed 52 charging stations, while HPCL has installed 382 charging stations.

The Department of Heavy Industry has recently sanctioned 1,576 public charging stations for 25 highways and expressways, which shall be located every 25km on both sides of the road.

What are your thoughts on EV charger installations gathering pace only in major cities? Let us know in the comments.