Wednesday, October 09, 2019
By Manoj Kumawat
New Guidelines For Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure
The Ministry of New and Renewable Resources has updated the new guidelines for developing the electric charging stations in the country. The draft of the guidelines has been approved by the Union Minister Honorable R.K. Singh. Informing about the new guidelines Mr. Singh said, that the new policies will look after the needs of the electric vehicle owners and help in creating an environment that will encourage the use of EVs among the car enthusiasts within the country. The implementation of the new guidelines automatically replaces the previous ones, that were issued back in the December 2018. According to the new guidelines, there is a requirement of developing one charging station within an area of three sq.km in the cities, and one charging station at the distance of every 25 km on the either sides of the highway.
According to the new guidelines, the development of charging stations will be accomplished in different phases. In the first phase, the charging stations will be developed within the period of three years, covering all the megacities connected with the expressways. After the completion of the first phase, the second phase will focus on developing the charging stations in the big cities. Moving ahead, the guidelines further address that the fast charging stations will be developed at the distance of 100 km in the collaboration with the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) appointed as the nodal agency for supporting the development of charging infrastructure across the country.
The ministry of New and Renewable Resources also speculates that the charging stations will be available at the short distances, thus making it easier for the owners to charge their vehicles either from fast or slow charging station at their will. The guidelines also address that the permission regarding the development of the private charging facility at the home and office will be allowed by the distribution companies (DISCOMs). It would be interesting to know that the charges for charging the vehicle will be same as charged for the consumption of electricity for the domestic purpose.
Moving ahead, according to the new guidelines, the public charging stations (PCS) will be de-licensed and any person or a group will be free to develop the charging stations. The PCS will also be free to install the chargers of different efficiencies, including CCS, CHAdeMO, Type-2 AC, Bharat AC 001, depending upon the market conditions.
