E-launch of Report on E-mobility & Low Carbon Passenger Road Transport

India has the second-largest road network in the world, with a total length of 5.89 million km, road transport contributes towards 64.5% of the country’s overall goods' movement, and caters to 90% of India’s total passenger traffic. Yet, India also has the lowest motorisation rates in the world (22 cars per 1,000 people), and it is among the fastest-growing countries in the transportation sector. From 2011 to 2020, India’s domestic vehicle sale (2W, 3W, Passenger Vehicle, Commercial Vehicle) has grown at ~4% CAGR. With rising income and rapid urbanisation, the Indian mobility market is expected to expand rapidly. Transportation, however, has contributed significantly to India’s overall GHG emission. During the year 2016, the transport sector contributed to 270.6 MT CO2e of GHG emission, third-highest, only after the power industry and industrial combustion.

The Nationally Determined Contribution – Transport Initiative for Asia (NDC-TIA) is a regional initiative funded by the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU). It is a joint project of seven organisations and with the engagement of China, India, and Vietnam. It aims at promoting a comprehensive approach to decarbonising transport, i.e., a coherent strategy of effective policies that are coordinated among various sector ministries, civil society, and the private sector. Under the regional technical assistance programme NDC-TIA, this study “Status quo analysis of various segments of Electric mobility and low carbon passenger road transport in India” was undertaken. The main objective of this study was to examine the Low-Carbon Road Transport (LCRT)/E- mobility development, accomplishments so far, supported by the policy, schemes, and regulatory interventions in India.

This report was released in an e-launch event on 4 February 2021 in the presence of dignitaries: Mr. Sudhendu Jyoti Sinha, Advisor, NITI Aayog, Dr. Winfried Damm, Head of Indo-German Energy Programme, GIZ India and Dr. Indradip Mitra, Coordinator India Component, NDC-TIA, GIZ India. The participants in this event lauded the efforts of the project team for developing an excellent knowledge product for all the stakeholders engaged in the e-Mobility mission.

Dr. Winfried Damm began by emphasising the importance of the knowledge hub Digital Library on Green Mobility, where the executive summary and the full report were available for download. He congratulated the Deloitte and GIZ team respectively for their efforts in preparing these reports. Through the presentation, he presented several facts which supported the mega-trend predictions for EV growth in the near future. A couple of his key messages were that e-mobility is crucial for sustainable mobility, but it has to be implemented in a holistic approach and the higher the share of Renewable Energies in the electricity mix, the bigger the benefits from e-mobility.

Mr. Sudhendu Jyoti Sinha congratulated GIZ, all the six consortium partners and the team which had worked assiduously on this insightful report. He reiterated that NITI Aayog was providing full support to all the line ministries to develop a full-fledged ecosystem for electric mobility at the earliest. Manufacturing, demand creation, research and development activities along with fiscal incentives, regulatory support and awareness creation were some thrust areas of focus for the government. India is all set to herald a common, connected, congestion-free and convenient transport system that is also clean and advanced. The report was released and the links to access the full report and the executive summary report were shared with the audience.

Mr. Anish Mandal, Director, Deloitte and Mr. Chandan Dixit, Manager, Deloitte presented the key findings from the report. The gaps in existing policies and schemes, key challenges, and barriers for EV adoption and the recommendations for the uptake of EVs were discussed in the presentation. Dr. Indradip Mitra ended the event with a token of gratitude to NITI Aayog, Deloitte team, consortium partners who had reviewed the report and the GIZ team for their efforts in developing the report and organising the launch event. He emphasised the support from all the stakeholders to overcome the challenges and make use of the opportunities in transitioning from ICE vehicles to EVs.

This study explores the overall status of Low-Carbon Road Transport in India such as achievements, supporting policies and gaps, government schemes, incentives, regulatory mechanisms, implementation challenges, financial interventions, business models, research advancements, other key challenges, and way forward. Special focus was given to the electric mobility sector for fulfilling this objective. It also distinguished the present clean-mobility landscape, critical challenges, emergent technology research advancement that are on the way of LCRT/ E-mobility systems electrification.

The findings from this report could enable policy makers, regulators, services, business models, and hence the Government of India to assess the need for actions, reform, and amendments required to increase the market uptake of LCRT/E-mobility in India.

The executive summary can be downloaded from here, and the full report can be downloaded from here.

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