Public-private partnership model mooted for building reliable EV charging network in cities

Public-private partnerships are a viable model for scaling up EV charging networks in cities and also to provide reliable charging solutions to drive electrification in commercial passenger fleets.

Over the past few months, electrification has gathered pace in commercial fleets, driven by lower operating costs and emission-related goals. This June, Tamil Nadu also allowed commercial fleets to operate electric cars for passenger transportation.

Even as the private sector is keen to scale up investments in charging infrastructure, system glitches in public charging stations and non-performing units set up by government-owned entities are causing concerns for fleet operators to expand with more electric cars. There are many non-functional charging stations reported in cities such as Chennai and New Delhi.

Also read: Interoperability of public charging stations important for EV proliferation

Industry stakeholders point out that government spaces in major cities could be licensed to private vendors to build, operate, and maintain charging stations as a viable solution.

“For the past few weeks, we have been successfully running the electric cars in our fleet for staff and people transportation. We have already taken delivery of 116 electric cars from Tata Motors for our Chennai fleet and we have plans to add another 100 electric cars to the Chennai fleet and 30 more to the Coimbatore fleet,” says S Natarajan, Managing Director of New Pandian Travels (NPT), which has massive fleet of 4000 vehicles and transport about 70,000 employees of various companies across southern cities.

While NPT is chalking out plans to add more e-cars to its fleet in Chennai, inadequate charging infrastructure and non-functional charging stations are posing challenges. Some public charging units in Chennai metro stations and in fuel outlets of Oil majors are not functioning. In Delhi too, a number of public charging stations of public sector entities are not functioning.

As of now, NPT primarily depends on its own slow chargers, built over a 25,000 sq ft area. Some of its corporate customers have set up charging units inside their campuses, while some others have secured approvals from authorities to enable NPT to set up charging units inside their premises.

CESL admits that there are teething issues in its public charging stations in cities like New Delhi and Tamil Nadu.

Rajneesh Rana, Head, Convergence, CESL (Convergence Energy Services Limited) points out that charging units of the company go out of order due to various reasons - glitches in software, equipment issues, power connection problems, etc. This infrastructure setup involves multiple stakeholders such as land-owning agencies, charging equipment suppliers, State DISCOMs, etc. So, there could be different reasons every time it goes out of order. “However, things will turn better as the space is maturing well,” he added.

CESL has planned 60 public charging stations in Chennai as part of its 1st phase expansion. It has already set up 40 charging units and is in the process of commissioning the remaining stations in the next month or so.

But, things in Chennai are not as bad as Delhi where the company has seen theft and vandalism in its charging units.

Several parts such as electrical harnesses and EV charging cords have become vulnerable to theft or vandalism. As utilization rates are very low currently, revenues are also poor in CESL’s public charging units in Delhi. With very low revenue levels, it sees challenges to deploy guards to man the stations and prevent vandalism.

“If the charging units don’t work, it will only create a negative image of the industry. So, a public-private partnership model is the way forward for installing a viable and functioning charging infrastructure in cities,” K P Karthikeyan, Co-Founder & CEO, Zeon Electric a leading charging infra (DC fast chargers) operator in south India.

Private charging infra operators seek spaces owned by metro, railways, and city corporations at reasonable rates to invest in setting up charging stations.

“If there are no private investments, the public sector can come forward and disrupt the market. But in EV charging infra space, there is healthy participation from private and they are keen on investing in scaling up the network,” he adds.

“For example, real estate is a big challenge in Chennai and if the government allows the private sector to set up public charging stations in metro stations and lands owned by Chennai Corporations or other government departments, there are a host of private sectors ready to put up the charging units, states Awadhesh Jha, Chairman, Indian Charge Point Operators Association.

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