Electric cars are being launched en masse, how to solve the bottleneck of charging station planning in Vietnam?

Faced with the trend of electric car development, relevant agencies are actively coordinating to synchronize and expand the scale of the charging station system.

Vietnam welcomes many electric cars towards the goal of carbon neutrality by 2050

A comprehensive charging station infrastructure with fast, reliable and convenient charging technology will make electric vehicles easier to use, promote environmentally friendly transportation and reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

In Vietnam, a number of businesses are manufacturing and assembling electric cars such as Vinfast with battery electric vehicles (BEV), Hyundai Thanh Cong with battery electric vehicles (BEV) and hybrid vehicles (HEV), Thaco with hybrid vehicles (HEV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV).

In the final stages of this year, car manufacturers will continue to launch more pure electric car products in the domestic market. A typical example is BYD, the leading brand in electric vehicle technology in China.

There are more and more electric car businesses in Vietnam. Photo: Hyundai

With the rapid development of electric cars in recent years, many businesses have expressed interest in the market providing equipment and services for electric vehicles, especially charging stations for electric cars in Vietnam.

But in reality, there are many challenges to developing charging stations in Vietnam. One of the most prominent difficulties is the high initial investment cost.

Setting up a network of charging stations requires a large initial investment, including infrastructure construction, equipment purchase and maintenance costs. At the same time, the demand for electric vehicles in Vietnam is not yet large enough to ensure sustainable revenue from charging stations. Large corporations may still be hesitant to invest heavily when the opportunity is not "ripe".

Currently, in addition to the electric car company VinFast, which is the pioneer in investing hundreds of millions of USD in the charging station system, other car companies are still waiting for investment from third parties, even though they have launched electric cars on the market.

According to a representative of iCharge Electric Vehicle Charging Solutions Joint Stock Company, the biggest difficulty in investing in charging stations is the huge cost. Currently, the basic investment for a 60-80Kw station is more than 700 million VND and for a 120Kw station is 1.2 billion VND. In addition to this fixed cost, there are other costs that have not been estimated, including connecting to the power infrastructure, construction permits, and rental fees...

Along with that, there are many shortcomings and barriers, preventing businesses from investing heavily in charging stations. Typically, Ho Chi Minh City is one of the largest electric car consumption centers in the country, but investing in charging stations here is currently facing many difficulties.

Specifically, investors in electric vehicle charging stations in Ho Chi Minh City said that when registering a business location for an electric vehicle charging station in a public place, they must receive a response from the Business Registration Office of the Department of Planning and Investment, then wait for responses from other departments and local authorities where the charging station is located. Businesses do not know how long to wait, so they are very passive in implementing the project, while the unit leasing the space for the charging station is urging them.

In addition, the power grid has not been designed to meet the simultaneous charging needs of many electric vehicles, especially in densely populated areas. There are also no preferential policies to encourage investment in charging station infrastructure. According to calculations, if the business electricity price is applied to charging stations, investing businesses will have almost no profit, and may even lose capital.

How to untie the knot?

According to a report by the Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers Association (VAMA), by 2030, the number of electric cars in Vietnam will reach about 1 million vehicles and by 2040, it will be 3.5 million vehicles.

With the International Energy Agency (IEA) standard recommendation of 10 electric vehicles/charging station, it is estimated that Vietnam will need 100,000 - 350,000 charging stations in the next 15 years. Currently, the largest number of electric vehicle charging stations in the country is still invested by VinFast, with a total of more than 3,000 stations and 150,000 charging ports, but not shared with other car manufacturers.

Commenting on the importance of the charging station system, Ms. Nguyen Thi Phuong Hien, Deputy Director of the Institute of Transport Strategy and Development, informed that if we want to successfully switch to electric vehicles, the prerequisite factor is the charging station infrastructure. Therefore, competent authorities should focus on supporting the construction of charging stations first.

Regarding this content, Dr. Ha Dang Son - Director of the Center for Energy and Green Growth Research said that the current infrastructure system cannot meet the needs of electric vehicles. If electric vehicles are developed too quickly while the supply capacity and electricity infrastructure cannot meet the demand, it will be a huge technical barrier.

"To attract people to buy electric vehicles, it is necessary to ensure the ability to fully meet the ecosystem and convenient infrastructure. In reality, the network of charging stations for routes from city to city, from province to province is still limited," said Mr. Son.

The Vietnamese government aims to synchronize and expand the electric vehicle charging station system. Photo: VinFast

In addition, many experts believe that Vietnam needs to have policies to support investors in electric charging stations in terms of land, planning, taxes, fees, as well as electricity pricing mechanisms based on the principle of direct support for electric vehicle users.

On the positive side of developing electric vehicle charging stations, Mr. Nguyen Van Thanh, General Director of GSM Company said: "Developing charging stations is one of the issues that we are encouraged by management agencies. Secondly, we are also cooperating with large gas stations to install charging stations. We will have more and more charging stations every day. Manufacturers will have to calculate from vehicle output to see how many charging stations are enough."

At the same time, some units commented that widespread charging stations contribute to creating trust for users to switch to electric vehicles. A representative of En Vang taxi company also said that widespread charging station infrastructure will contribute to creating trust for both businesses and consumers to switch to electric vehicles because this affects business efficiency and capital recovery time.

Therefore, in the most recent working session on the issue of electric vehicle charging stations, the Ministry of Industry and Trade informed that it will coordinate with the Ministry of Science and Technology to unify responsibilities with related units such as the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Construction, and local authorities in planning a synchronous charging station system.

At the same time, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will urgently study and adjust the National Electricity Plan for the period up to 2050. Because currently, if the trend of using electric vehicles increases, the amount of electricity consumption will be very large. Meanwhile, the new plan only calculates the amount of electricity consumption for production and consumption, but the use of electric vehicles has not been mentioned.

Up to now, the planning of power supply sources, the system of standards and national technical regulations on charging stations in Vietnam is still being urgently implemented by the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the Ministry of Science and Technology and related units. These are positive signals for the development of the electrified car market in Vietnam, achieving the goal of reducing emissions from vehicles, towards carbon neutrality according to the Government's international commitments.

Source: https://congthuong.vn/o-to-dien-o-at-ra-mat-go-nut-that-quy-hoach-tram-sac-tai-viet-nam-ra-sao-356943.html