What a 5th floor kitchen of a Bengaluru apartment

A Bengaluru executive hauled his EV scooty up all the way to his 5th-floor kitchen to charge it after losing a fight with his RWA to install a charging point in his locality’s parking. The kitchen ‘jugaad’ made quite a buzz, first on LinkedIn and then in the Electrical Vehicle world — on a day when Ola was supposed to roll out its EV scooter.

(The bookings of Ola scooty have been delayed by a week due to a website glitch.
Read Bhavesh Aggarwal’s apology here).

Those with bigger pockets are holding out for Tesla, which is gearing up to enter the country, nudging the government to lower import duties, which has been a teething point so far.According to a Reuters report, the union government has re-drawn a plan to give $8billion to car makers which use petrol, with added benefits to EVs. In the revised plan, the focus is only on auto makers that build electric and hydrogen-powered vehicles. There is a $3.5billion bonanza worth of incentives for EV makers over the next five years.

Vish Ganti, vice-president (product management & GM) of AutoGrid India, wrote about what happened on his LinkedIn account (picture above)
“My apartment community in the so-called EV capital of India (Bengaluru) wouldn’t let me install an EV charging point after trying to educate them and fighting an uphill battle for four months. So I decided to load up my scooter in the elevator and bring it up to my unit on the fifth floor to charge it in the kitchen, as a sign of protest and to create awareness of this ground reality,” his post read.

Many states such as Delhi exempt EVs from road tax and registration fees,

So with the EV party all set to begin, why was the kitchen ‘jugaad’ necessary? In other words, what is not happening to make the consumer experience better?

There just aren’t enough public charging stations. From Kochi to New Delhi, ET reportage this year shows that charging stations haven’t kept pace with demand for EV vehicles. Most private EV vehicle owners charge their car at home, viewing public charging stations as a last resort, reported the Associated Press. Commercial EV drivers (such as three-wheelers) lose half a day’s salary just getting their vehicle charged.

Discoms or electricity distribution companies in various metros are still sleeping on the job and haven’t yet woken up to the importance of installing charging stations in apartment complexes. Auto companies need to work with them to make sure consumer experiences become better. Delhi has 85 charging stations currently. Bengaluru, the EV mecca of India, has 136 charging stations in 70 locations. Vish Ganti, vice-president of AutoGrid India, who pulled off the kitchen charging of his scooter, told the Times of India: “It’s time Bescom (Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Limited) created awareness among RWAs about EV. In my earlier apartment complex, I managed to install a charging unit. The catch was the cost to wire this charger to the Bescom meter. Fun fact: charger costs Rs 2,000 but the cost to wire it to the Bescom meter was Rs 11,000.” If EVs have to take off, auto companies must rope in discoms (or private vendors) for pricing charging infrastructure correctly.

India, as a country, needs work on batteries to bring down the cost of EVs. Battery raw material is expensive with China cornering a chunk of the market.

The country has reportedly offered $4.6 billion in incentives to companies setting up advanced battery manufacturing facilities as it seeks to promote the use of electric vehicles and cut down its dependence on oil. India plans to retain its import tax rate of 5% for certain types of batteries, including batteries for electric vehicles, until 2022, but will increase it to 15% thereafter to promote local manufacturing, a report by Reuters said.

Source link