There are almost as many places to charge your electric vehicle in Beijing as there are in the entire United States.
China, the world’s biggest market for EVs, has about eight public chargers for each one in the U.S., according to the latest counts. That imbalance likely will become more pronounced as China champions the technology spurring automakers to pivot away from gasoline and accelerates its rollout of electric pumps, enlisting energy giants Royal Dutch Shell and BP along the way.
A new-energy vehicle development plan under consideration by Chinese officials and intended to shape the sector through 2035 will set new goals for boosting the number of public and private chargers, a person familiar with the proposal said in September. The nation is said to be weighing a target for 60 percent of all automobiles sold to run on electric motors by then.
All told, China’s electric fleet may swell to 162 million vehicles by 2040, according to forecasts by BloombergNEF.
“The availability of charging facilities has been rising pretty quickly,” said Jing Kai, deputy head of the Beijing unit at Qingdao TGOOD Electric Co., which has the country’s largest network of charging plugs. “The goal is to help EV users charge their cars wherever they go, making it as easy as buying a bottle of water.”
China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, which oversees policy making for the auto sector, didn’t respond to a faxed query.