Written By: Sarthak Arora
The last decade has been a decade of wonders for the EV industry adoption and this process of adoption is still in continuation. We are seeing the launch of electric cars all over the world. India being one of the biggest markets for cars provides a great opportunity for Electric vehicle’ manufacturers. But when we talk about EV in India, we tend to question, “Is India ready for Electric vehicles?”
To answer this question we all need to first understand what are the challenges that the EV industry is facing and will have to face in its journey towards mass adoption by the people of India?
The major difficulties/challenges for EV in India are:
Charging Infrastructure
As of June 2020, India had established around 927 EV charging stations but if we compare it to the 57000 petrol pumps that the country has, we can see that the numbers are quite less and India still needs to work a lot on the establishment of EV charging stations considering the size of the market it has.
Also, according to a report, 85% of charging of Electric vehicles is done at the home of the owner. So those living in a community apartment can struggle with charging their electric vehicles.
Lack Of Human Resource
Since EV in India is still at its early stage, the country is facing a lack of expertise and skills in the EV industry. This not only bothers innovation in the industry by the country but also possess difficulty to the foreign investors who find it difficult to gain assistance from human resources provided by the country due to their lack of expertise in the EV industry.
Consumer Market
The average price of an electric car in India starts from about Rs 13 lacs and that of a fuel-powered car at 4.5 lacs. This difference of 3x between both types can lead to a loss of a big chunk of the consumer market for the EV manufactures and hence provide uncertainties to the brands looking to attain success in the industry.
Battery:
The battery used in electric vehicles is made up of Lithium. As the country has a lack of lithium it is dependent upon the import of the Lithium batteries used in electric vehicles.
This poses a major difficulty for the investors looking forward to investing in India’s Electric vehicles industry. The country needs to be self-sufficient in the production of the raw material required by the EV industry and it also needs more planning to overcome this challenge.
With these challenges in existence, it is difficult for the electric vehicle industry to sustain itself in the country but with proper planning and efforts, India can overcome these challenges and can fulfil its vision of mass adoption of electric vehicle technology all over the country.