In recent years, India has dispatched numerous strategies to make electric vehicles a triumph and see them on the streets, yet have flopped. Why put forth so many attempts for something which has never shown any outcomes? All things considered, the explanation is the expanding contamination everywhere in the country, particularly in metropolitan urban areas like Delhi.
Delhi’s air is turning poisonous. It increments incredibly in winters in light of the vaporous poisons from Punjab and Haryana, where farmers set their homesteads ablaze subsequent to collecting. The fireworks on the celebration of Diwali. So, the question is, what’s going to be different so that the electric vehicles are not a failure this time?
The government of NCT announced the Delhi Electric Vehicle Policy on 7 August, 2020. The main motive of this policy is to promote the adoption of electric vehicles and making Delhi the EV Capital of India. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal recognised it as “the most progressive” policy in India.
Moreover, he mentioned that over 5,00,000 new EVs would be registered in the next 5 years through this.
Incentives by the Government
To promote electric vehicles, Delhi’s EV policy provides various incentives to the people. The incentive ranges from ₹5,000 to ₹30,000. For bikes, a purchase incentive of ₹5,000 per kWh of battery capacity shall be given.
In the case of E-autos, a purchase incentive of ₹30,000 shall be provided and an additional of ₹7,500 for scrapping old CNG run autos. These E-autos will not have a cap like other CNG run autos, which cannot exceed 1,00,000 in the city. Similar incentives will be granted to the buyers of the first 10,000 battery-driven goods carriers.
Talking about four-wheelers, the first 1,000 purchasers of E-cars will get a maximum of ₹1,50,000 incentive per vehicle. Furthermore, road taxes and registration fees will also be waived according to the policy.
Recycling of Batteries
A battery needs to be replaced once it is degraded to working at 70–80% of its capacity. So, it’s pretty obvious that the life of electric vehicles outlives that of a battery. A vehicle requires two batteries in a lifespan of 10 years and the used batteries need to be recycled because they can be very hazardous to the environment.
If not recycled properly, it carries a risk of giving off toxic gases. Although the policy admits that it’s essential to recycle the batteries properly, it doesn’t provide any guidance on how and where it should be done. So, this remains a questionable aspect in electric vehicles.
Charging Infrastructure
The policy lays out various parameters about the charging infrastructure and encourages everyone to install them. As mentioned in the policy, “Experience in other cities across the globe indicates that availability of charging infrastructure is a key aspect of Electric Vehicle adoption.”
It also talks about changing the building by-laws so that all new homes and buildings are “EV ready” with 20% of all vehicle holding/parking capacity for electric vehicles. Also, a grant of ₹6,000 shall be provided to the first 30,000 buyers of the charger.
Getting to public charging points, the policy aims at providing accessible public charging facilities within 3 km of distance from anywhere in Delhi by inviting companies to set up these points at bare minimum lease rentals.
As the policy is laid with the main objective of cleaning up the air of Delhi, it holds great promise of a sustainable future. If, as predicted, there are five lakh EVs on the roads of Delhi in the next 5 years, it will avoid approximately 4.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, which is equivalent to avoiding CO2 emissions from nearly one lakh petrol cars over their lifetime.
By Saumya Gupta