The importance of charging facility targets in Europe

Europe is electrifying. With well over one million registrations in 2020, electric cars reached a new sales record. Europe is now even ahead of China with the share of new BEVs and PHEVs in total sales. That’s great news! However, in order to continue this growth and to achieve the ambitious EU targets in terms of CO2 reduction, it’s necessary to speed up the expansion of the European charging facility infrastructure for electric cars.

Unfortunately, the infrastructure is not keeping pace with increased sales of electric vehicles. This is rather strange since European governments initiate tax benefits or incentives to promote electric driving! The fact that the infrastructure stays behind may result in us reaching a point where the increase in the number of electric cars stalls. Because of a shortage of charging points, or queues at a charging facility. This should not be a reason not to buy an electric car, when consumers actually want to. For example, around 75% of all charging points in Europe are located in just five countries. Namely in The Netherlands, Norway, Germany, France and the UK.

At MG, we’re committed to making electric mobility accessible. But we need a decent charging infrastructure for our customers to keep our promises. We therefore fully support the urgent call from the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA), Transport & Environment (T&E) and the European Consumer Organization (BEUC). In a joint letter to the EU commissioners for climate, transport, industry and energy, it was asked to have one million public charging points operational by 2024, and three million by 2029.

This goal sends out a clear signal that the number of public charging points is growing in line with the electric vehicle fleet. So European motorists can purchase an electric car with confidence, without fear of a lack of charging solutions. It is obviously important that the charging infrastructure is well distributed across Europe. And not limited to a select number of countries.

As emphasized in the joint letter, this also offers opportunities for network operators and charging station operators. Additionally, it has the potential to create countless jobs in this sector. EV charging targets per country are a great way to make this happen!