The LUMS Energy Institute, in collaboration with the Ministry of Climate Change and the National Center in Big Data and Cloud Computing (NCBC), has pointed out 85 locations on motorways and the national highways where the electric vehicle (EV) charging stations can be set up.
The revelation was made in a report titled ‘Developing Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Across Highways and Motorways of Pakistan’ that discussed the concerns and potential of EV normalization in Pakistan.
The report detailed that:
There are almost 85 locations across M-1, M-2, M-3, M-4, M-5, M-9, and N-5 are available for the development of DC-fast charging infrastructure for Electric Vehicles (EVs) to prevent ‘range-anxiety’ in adoption of modern electric cars in Pakistan.
It highlighted 15 ‘prioritized’ locations for the installation of charging infrastructure that will be used for EVs across Pakistan. The effort is geared toward reducing harmful emissions in the country by 20 percent by 2030, which it pledged to do by signing the Paris Climate Agreement.
One of the authors of the report, Hafiz Owais Ahmed Khan, told the media that the installation of 10 DC-fast chargers at each of the prioritized locations would fulfill the charging requirements of a majority of EV owners for inter-city commutes in all the metropolises.
He clarified that the charging infrastructure at these locations will only be beneficial in the short term due to a limited EV market presence. Additionally, their long-term effects will be noticeable once the EV market share is on par with the internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles as it will warrant a more thorough charging infrastructure.
