DAVID FURLONGER: SA is charged with … not much

Europe is forecast to have 20-million electric vehicle (EV) home chargers by 2025, up from about 4-million in 2020. By 2030, expect the number to be about 53-million, says international automotive consultancy S&P Global Mobility.

French market intelligence company ReportLinker estimates there are 2.4-million public charging stations around the world. This, it says, will rise to 14.6-million by 2027.

And in SA? Not so many. But don’t despair, says Winstone Jordaan, MD of GridCars, SA’s biggest installer of EV charging stations. The tide is about to turn.

There are thought to be about 300 public charging stations in SA, alongside major highways and at petrol stations, car dealerships, airports and shopping malls. Accurate home-charger numbers are harder to come by. Products are available over-the-counter for R5,000 and upwards. “My guesstimate is that there are 200-300 units out there,” says an analyst.

GridCars claims to have more than 300 public and domestic charging stations. It installs charging stations in the homes of Mercedes-Benz and Jaguar EV customers and has a growing portfolio of corporate customers. Jordaan hopes to install up to a dozen for a national hotel chain in coming months.

Then there are Grid’s own stations — mostly along national roads. Some make money but the overall network is unprofitable. Jordaan expects this to change “in three to four years”. To be profitable, he says, a public charger must be used for at least four hours daily.

Grid and its 75% shareholder, solar power specialist Solareff, take a long view of their investment. Someone has to, says Jordaan, otherwise no-one will invest in EV infrastructure while they wait for vehicle sales to boom. Without infrastructure, there can be no boom.   

In other countries, that wait is over. Globally, sales of battery-powered cars, bakkies and  commercial vehicles grew by more than 100% in 2021, to 6.7-million. That gave an overall new-vehicle market share of 8.3%. In SA, sales also more than doubled — to 218, and a 0.046% share.

Further sharp growth in SA demand is likely this year, as more motor companies show off their EV wares, and more powerful batteries take away some of the fear of running out of power mid-journey. But EVs are expensive to buy (though not to run)  and unless the government offers local consumers the same price incentives that have helped sales flourish in other countries, market share will remain derisory.

The government’s tardiness in devising an EV policy — a promised white paper is already six months overdue — is not helping.

Yet Jordaan says interest is flourishing. At any given time, he says, Grid is talking to up to 20 companies about potential installations. He cites the example of a Tshwane shopping mall manager who said he didn’t need a charger because no EVs visited. How did he know, responded Jordaan. Could the manager tell EVs from other cars? And maybe EV drivers were avoiding the mall because they couldn’t recharge? The manager finally relented and the charger is now the third-busiest — and one of the most profitable — in Grid’s portfolio.

I’m not going to write here about the pros and cons of EVs. But it is interesting to look at how consumers in the rest of the world have adjusted to the issue of charging, as a guide to how SA may react.

A study by S&P Global Mobility has found that 55% of EV owners prefer to charge their vehicles at home. Another 20% favour a combination of home and office charging, while 25% choose “public and semi-public” facilities designed for passing customers.

Increasingly, says S&P consulting executive director Tanja Linken, motorists want standalone public chargers to be next to cafés and convenience stores so drivers have something to do while their cars charge. Jordaan sympathises. He had to wait 40 minutes at a popular Cape Town charger after he arrived to find it already in use.

SA isn’t alone in its slow EV uptake. The S&P study shows that across the Middle East and Africa, battery-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles (not to be confused with the self-regenerating hybrids on SA roads, with their dual electric and petrol motors) accounted for 0% of vehicles on the roads in 2020. This wasn’t unusual. South America and South Asia were the same.  

China led the way with 1.5%, followed by Europe (0.5%), North America (0.3%) and Japan/Korea (0.2%).

By 2030, the Middle East/Africa share is forecast to be 5%. Where that growth will come from is not clear: Middle East countries, with their economic reliance on oil, may be hesitant to fully promote the EV alternative. South America is the only region, with 0.5%, forecast to have a slower uptake. China is expected to lead the way with 23%, followed by Europe (19%), North America and South Asia (12% each), and Japan/Korea (8%).         ​