E-mobility: Technology vs Vandalism

AUTHOR: David Jarrett and Team Editor@ RDJ Publishing and RDJ Group ChiefExecutiveOfficer

Thefutureoftransit Courtesy:VirtualVehicle

At an average new vehicle purchase rate of 10 000 to 20 000 per annum, there is a mountain and not a hill to climb for electric vehicles to be a substantial part of the new vehicle fleet in Namibia Thus, e-mobility is still to take root in Namibia but even so there is an opportunity for not only adoption of e-mobility but adoption of lessons learnt.

One of the key lessons the emobility sector is learning is that economics trumps any amount of awareness raising for the climate agenda Improving air quality and fighting global warming to reduce CO2 emissions from internal combustion engines (ICE) while understandable and urgent, just isn’t enough to drive the needed change.

“Virtual Assistant” notes that one of the biggest obstacles to the large-scale introduction of electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles is the limited storage capacity of electric batteries, which limits the range of the vehicles. This obstacle can be overcome through optimized energy use. It will require a vehicle occupant-centric approach, taking into account space, cost and complexity requirements The optimistic approach that major sales of electric vehicles (EV’s) reaching some 90% of new vehicle sales as noted by EY and Eurelectric will not materialise without development of needed infrastructure and policy measures.

The Netherlands has the most electric vehicle charging points per capita and spatially have the densest charging infrastructure network The country draws its strong position from collaboration with and interlinking of stakeholders. The Dutch government drives national policy focusing on encouraging electric mobility in general but assigns decision-making power to regions and municipalities Local authorities structure local incentive programmes, such as Amsterdam’s city-specific decarbonisation strategy to drive electric vehicle penetration

For charging infrastructure, the Dutch government instated the Dutch “right to charge” as a demand-driven approach It requires the municipalities to set up public charging points within 250m of a home at the request of the citizens who own an electric vehicle The charging point operators (CPO) validate the demand and choose the charging points’ location based on transparent criteria, including available capacity, accessibility, visibility and local impacts. The charging point is set up in collaboration with government bodies and distribution system operators (DSO), ensuring grid stability, and that EV charging data flows to all parties

Standards and open protocols are also at the centre of the Dutch government’s National Charging Infrastructure Agenda. The multi-year policy programme, which entails a set of agreements between the various stakeholders, is an integrated approach to achieve the fast upscaling of charging infrastructure Apart from implementation and price transparency, open protocols and open markets, the agenda aims to boost smart charging. Collaboratively, the stakeholders develop market modes and technical architecture and organise legislation and regulation.

To promote the integrated planning of charging infrastructure, the German National Centre for Charging Infrastructure provides stakeholders with three different publicly available tools. Firstly, the Standorttool which indicates the currently installed CPs, the planned CPs and the forecasted future demand. Secondly, the Flächentool, which allows CPOs to identify potential sites for projects Finally, the Ladelerntool, which aims at increasing the know-how on charging infrastructure within municipalities

Charging is a major issue for Namibia as if too many variants enter the market, then it will create a difficulty for types Courtesy: evcharge co za

EV adoption. With five charger types currently on the market, choosing the “right one” could determine success or failure for charger investment elucidating why no major investment has been made to date for Namibia. For example, The Type 1 Plug is the standard plug for electric vehicle charging in the United States and Japan. The 1st generation Nissan Leaf is the only EV in South Africa that uses this type of plug.Another barrier to be overcome is related to the fact that Tesla uses its own charge plug and ecosystem for its supercharging network in the U.S but has adopted the Type 2 / CCS 2 standard in Europe Tesla is expected to adopt the Type 2 / CCS 2 standard for South Africa

A focus thus is needed to push standardisation, long-term planning, market mechanisms supported by piloting programs Thus, Namibia realising this can make the time efficient by giving incentives for infrastructure rollout that would eventually encourage purchases of EV’s over internal combustion engines (ICE) vehicles So maybe in time ICE shouldreallybereservedforICE,“in case of emergency” As always, the conversation continues infocus@rdjpublishing.africa

Readings:

https://www autoevolution com/news/vandals-are-cuttingsupercharger-cables-but-tesla-is-on-top-of-it-233742 html https://ijg net/research/new-vehicle-sales-may-2023/ https://www virtual-vehicle at/applications/e-mobilityinfrastructure/ https://www ey com/en uk/news/2023/04/uk-s-ev-success-hingeson-six-essentials https://changing-transport org/5-success-factors-for-charginginfrastructure-roll-out/ (EXTRACT) https://evcharge co za/learn-electric-vehicle-charging-south-africa