Would you like to know how to start an electric vehicle charging station business in India?
The Government has delicensed the electric vehicle charging stations. So, anyone can set up a charging station in India provided that such stations meet the technical as well as performance standards and protocols.
Electric Vehicle Charging Station Business in India
An electric vehicle charging station is one of the best business opportunities related to electric vehicles. We have an article about the top electric vehicle business opportunities that explains more than 10 successful EV business ideas.
The government has taken initiatives to promote manufacturing and promotion of electric vehicles in India.
Objectives of Charging Infrastructure for Electric Vehicles
The main objectives of the policy updates are the following
- To enable the faster adoption of electric vehicles by ensuring safe, reliable, accessible, and affordable charging infrastructure and eco-system.
- To promote affordable tariff chargeable from EV owners and charging station operators or owners
- To generate employment and income opportunities for small entrepreneurs
- To proactively support the creation of EV charging infrastructure in the initial phase and eventually create a market for the EV charging business
- To encourage preparedness of the Electrical Distribution System to adopt EV charging infrastructure
Now let’s check out a few important points to note while starting a charging station business.
The foremost thing is that the setting up of the public charging station has been de-licensed activity and any individual/entity is free to set up a public charging station. They should meet the technical as well as performance standards and protocols. The charging station owner is to abide by the norms of the Ministry of Power and Central Electricity Authority.
It says that any person seeking to set up a public charging station would get the connectivity on priority from the Distribution Company.
It is also possible to get electricity from the generation company through open access as well.
What are the minimum requirements to start a public charging infrastructure?
The minimum infrastructure required to start a public charging station is the following.
- An exclusive transformer with all the related substation equipment including safety appliances
- Line termination and metering equipment
- Appropriate civil works and adequate space for charging, entry, and exit of vehicles
- There should be one or more electric boards with installations as shown (including the international standards CCS and CHadeMO)
- Another point is that the public charging station providers are free to create charging hubs and to install additional chargers
- Regarding the booking of charging station slot, the provider has to tie up with at least one Online Service Providers (NSP) to enable advance online booking of the charging slots by EV owners. It is mandatory to include the location, types, and the number of chargers installed to the online data to the EV owners.
- The charging station data have to be shared with appropriate DISCOM and that shall be accessed by the Central Electricity Authority.
- Appropriate public amenities is also a must
If you want to add a fast-charging facility to the station then additional infrastructures such as Liquid-cooled cables and climate control equipment are also required.
The operation of the charging station is based on the clearance certificate from the concerned electrical inspectors and technical persons from the DISCOMS. The charging equipment has to be tested by a reputed authority.
Don’t you know about battery swapping stations?
The public charging stations can also have the option to add standalone battery swapping facilities. That is optional. If you want to scale up the business you may consider it as well.
But all the points we discussed above are the mandatory facilities to start a public charging station/network.
Those are not applicable for private charging stations for noncommercial use.
The Public charging infrastructure for long distance EVs and heavy duty EVs such as buses are a bit different.
Reference: Charging Infrastructure for Electric Vehicles – Guidelines and Standards
Now let’s move on to the details of the location for the public charging stations
Since the plan is to set up the best facility for EV charging, the government directs to install at least one charging station in a grid of 3km X 3km.
One highways and roads, there should be at least one charging stations at every 25km on both sides of the roads.
For bus and trucks the charging station shall be located at every 100kms, and in cities, they shall be installed in bus depots.
The State Nodal Agencies would select Implementation agencies finalizing the cities where to install the charging stations. The selection will be by bidding. The individual charging station providers will be decided by the implementation agency.
It says that the government may give priority to existing retail outlets of oil marketing companies for installation of public EV charging stations.
To keep everything on arranged, the Central Electricity Authority will create and maintain a national online database for all the public charging stations though DISCOM.
These are the mega cities that have a population greater than 4 million and connected express highways that would be selected for EV charging installation in the phase I.
Conclusion
We have discussed the details about the electric vehicle charging station business in India. The delicensed charging station would helps out to the faster adoption of electric vehicles.
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Key points
- Set up Electric Vehicle charging stations is a delicensed activity now
- Minimum requirements to start an EV charging station business is discussed
- Major cities have been selected for phase I of the project
