The ride towards electric vehicles has been slower than the govt would have hoped in India. To give the EV ride some acceleration the government has modified the FAME scheme which will make electric 2-wheeler cheaper under the new scheme. Here are the highlights-:
- Demand incentives for electric two-wheelers will be increased 50%, to Rs15k/KWh.
- Incentives will, however, be capped at 40% of the cost of the vehicle.
- Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) – a JV between NTPC Ltd, Rural Electrification Corp. Ltd, Power Finance Corp. Ltd, and Power Grid Corp. of India Ltd. – will aggregate demand for 300k electric three-wheelers.
- For electric buses, nine key cities with population of more than 4 million will be targeted – Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Surat, and Pune
- EESL will again act as an aggregator of demand for the remaining e-buses on an opex basis. The details of implementation shall be worked out by EESL.
Only 6% of the target of 1 mn electric two-wheelers by 2022 under the FAME scheme has been achieved so far. The numbers are even lower for three-wheelers and four-wheelers at 3% each.