Mass Electric Mobility in India

Public transportation fulfills the needs of majority of daily commuters in India. Although many forms of public transportation exists but buses have a unique positioning because of their role in last-mile connectivity. Also, for a given amount of road space, the passengers served by a bus are 5 times more than the passengers served by cars. Therefore, in view of the increasing demand for transportation services in India, buses play a critical role.

Buses in India primarily run on diesel or CNG as fuel which is not an environmentally sustainable proposition. In the long run, the maintenance cost of buses, increase in fuel costs and adverse impact on environment outweighs the transport services received. Thus, a gradual shift towards sustainable sources of fuel for the purpose of mass transportation is necessary. Electricity could be one such fuel source which has minimal impact on environment and gives on-road performance at par with diesel or CNG. Moreover, when the electricity is sourced from renewable sources such as solar and wind energy, the complete value chain of mass mobility becomes environmentally sustainable.

Government of India has released several policies to boost the penetration of electric vehicle in transportation sector. FAME (Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Electric/Hybrid vehicles) is one such policy initiative under which subsidy (up to 60% of cost) is provided to state municipal corporations on purchase of new electric buses. Many states have taken advantage of this scheme and inculcated electric buses in their current fleet. This policy has also rejuvenated the electric bus manufacturing sector in India, big players such as TATA, Ashok Leyland, Mahindra & Mahindra etc. have expanded as well as improved their product offerings and several new players in association with foreign partners (e.g. BYD) have entered in this sector. As a result, advanced electric mobility technology will be available to state corporations at very competitive rates.

Policies for promoting electric mobility released in India till now focus more on apparent stakeholders such as bus manufacturers, sate municipal corporations and central agencies but ignore one underlying stakeholder, the power distribution utilities. Even after successful procurement and commissioning of electric buses in the fleet, the onus of providing electricity and ensuring supply continuity lies with power utilities. As electricity usage for mobility purposes is an entirely new concept in India, power utilities are certainly under-prepared for this new type of demand. Therefore, the success of large scale deployment of electric buses is highly dependent on strengthening of electric infrastructure of power utilities.

Following are some of the key challenges which need to be addressed for mass adopting of electric vehicles across India.

• Lack of technological infrastructure: Excluding some excelling Indian power utilities, there is a serious gap in advance technology adoption among utilities in general. With the addition of electricity demand from transportation, the current infrastructure of utilities will prove to be highly inadequate. Moreover, utilities will be expected to accurately predict demand, manage instances of peak/low demand, integrate RE sources for environment sustainability goals etc. Therefore, sensitization of utilities is necessary so that future requirements on account of mobility needs are comprehensively assessed and planned. 
• Establishment of charging stations: The range of electric vehicles is limited by the battery storage capacity and overall vehicle efficiency. Frequent battery re-charges will be required if the range of vehicle is low. Some of the factors to be considered in establishing charging stations are
• Viable battery charging speeds taking into account economic and technology constraints
• Strategic locations of charging stations
• Battery charging schedule so as to minimize impact on grid
• Provision of ancillary services (e.g. V2G)
• Implementation model: The appropriateness of the implementation model will determine the economic feasibility of deploying electric buses. A vehicle owned model is highly desirable because corporations will get full control over the usage of buses. However, the financial state of majority of corporations stems any outright purchase of electric buses each costing in the range of INR 2-3 crore. On the other hand, a vehicle lease model replaces upfront capital payment with small monthly installments which seems more suitable for corporations. However, the realized cost of ownership of vehicle may increase manifold and overall losses of corporations may also increase due to any inefficiency in operations. As the traditional models have some negatives, innovative models such as revenue sharing, franchisee model etc. can be devised on case-to-case basis.
• Controlling revenue leakages: Majority of the state bus corporations are loss making entities as they fail to control revenue leakages. These leakages can be stopped by the aid technology – digitization of ticket booking system, enabling electronic payments etc.