87% Indians would buy electric vehicles if that reduced pollution

87% Indians would buy electric vehicles if that reduced pollution Transportation accounts for about 11 per cent of India's carbon emissions and is a major source of air pollution in several cities nationwide.

Current Affairs : About 87 per cent of Indian drivers and vehicle owners would buy an electric vehicle (EV), if that helped reduce air pollution, according to a new survey.

Only 12 per cent would switch to EVs to avoid using petrol and diesel, according to the survey commissioned by Climate Trends, a Bengalurubased nonprofit, which polled more than 2,000 Indian drivers, owners and those who planned to buy a car. In 2017, India sold about 900,000 EVs, 4 per cent of the volume of diesel and petrol vehicles sold.

Transportation accounts for about 11 per cent of India’s carbon emissions and is a major source for air pollution in several cities nationwide. As many as 14 of the world’s top 20 most-polluted cities are in India, according to a 2018 World Health Organization (WHO) report.

The findings of the Climate Trends survey were launched on September 6, 2018, a day before the start of a two-day long conference organised by NITI Aayog, the central government’s think-tank. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was expected to launch a policy on ‘Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and Electric vehicles’ (FAME-II), muchanticipated policy for the Indian EV industry. The first phase, FAME-I, was released in 2015.

The launch, however, was postponed to rework the policy after the prime minister “indicated” a major change in the thrust of the policy, the Times Of India reported on September 7, 2018. The policy will focus on reducing the price of batteries in vehicles, deviating from its earlier focus on reducing the price of the entire vehicle by providing subsidies, said the report...Read more