One of the main brakes on the electric vehicle, the few charging points available, is less and less so. Last year, 8,200 new points were installed, representing 38% of the public charging infrastructures in operation in Spain at the end of 2022. There could have been 7,400 more points if it were not for “the existing problems in our country regarding the concession of licenses and permits by public administrations and management with distribution companies”, according to the complaint of the Business Association for the Development and Promotion of Electric Mobility (Aedive) in its first Yearbook of Electric Mobility 2022-2023. On the other hand, 2022 closed with a total of 325,675 electric vehicles registered, between 100% electric and plug-in hybrids.
There are more charging points than ever and also more electric vehicles, however the average use of charging facilities is only 4.2%. The main reason behind this underuse is the low electrification of the national car park, in which less than 1% of the total number of registered vehicles are electric. Arturo Pérez de Lucia, general director of Aedive, points to a second explanation: “of the fleet of electric vehicles registered until 2022 in Spain, only 36% were capable of using public charging infrastructures, since 40% are plug-in hybrids and the rest, vehicles that are recharged at any domestic socket or by exchanging batteries, so they do not use the public recharging networkâ€.
In other words, “except for some areas, today there is a reasonable deployment of charging points depending on the number of registered electric vehicles,” says Pérez de Lucia. For his part, Óscar Pulido, an expert in corporate fleets from the European Federation of Transport and Environment (Transport and Environment), points out that “we have improved the charging infrastructure, but it is still not what we need if we want to fully electrify the car park . With this, in no case do I want to say that you cannot currently travel with an electric vehicle in Spain; you can, but the user experience is not as good as it could beâ€.
With the lack of charging points removed for the moment, “the main barrier to electric vehicles continues to be price and incentives,” says the CEO of Aedive. “Quality electric cars are needed (I don’t mean luxury) at more affordable prices (whether first-hand or second-hand),” claims the Transport and Environment expert. In this sense, there are important changes in the market. The manufacturer of high-end electric vehicles Tesla has substantially lowered the price of several of its models, which have come to have prices similar to electric vehicles from cheaper manufacturers. Ford and Volkswagen have joined the measure and in the electricity sector there is already talk of a price war.
Spain is more a producer than a consumer of electric vehicles: 6.7% of the vehicles manufactured in the country in March are pure electric and 5% are plug-in hybrids, according to the Spanish Association of Automobile and Truck Manufacturers. (Anfac). These are figures that are increasing and that must grow even more to meet the decarbonization objectives of the car park. Specifically, in March, a total of 27,799 electrified vehicles were manufactured, which represents an increase of 39.8% in production volume compared to the same month in 2022.
