Charging infrastructure of Ukraine does not keep up with the growth of the number of electric vehicles
The infrastructure for electric vehicles, and primarily charging stations, is developing more slowly than the number of electric vehicles is growing. This applies to all countries where electric cars are an important component of the total traffic, including Ukraine.
There are several reasons for this trend:
strong enough oil lobby;
legislative problem;
infrastructure problems.The first reason is the local confrontation, when large network fuel stations, which understandably control the most profitable places, resist the penetration of electric vehicles, as it directly affects the loss of profit. This is typical for the US, Europe and Ukraine, but the examples of Shell in Europe, Chevron in the US and individual gas stations in Ukraine demonstrate that the “ice has moved” and oil companies understand the inevitability of the coming transport revolution.
The second reason lies in the fact that many aspects of the construction, installation and connection of charging stations, due to the novelty and little knowledge of the industry, are not yet thoroughly spelled out in the legislation, which largely inhibits their expansion. This is particularly true for Ukraine and not only for the development of infrastructure, but also for the entire electric vehicle industry, taking into account the production of electric cars and battery components, market regulation, traffic rules, updating construction standards, determining privileges for electric cars.
The third problem, in fact, is the inability to install charging stations of particularly high power in suitable places, primarily due to the unexplored network infrastructure and the difficulty of accessing the required capacity. This problem requires a comprehensive solution on the part of both the state and the grid operator.
However, with regard to Ukraine, not everything is so bad and many problems are solved faster than people think. This is at least evidenced by the rapid pace of the emergence of charging stations, because their number in Ukraine over the past 5 years has increased 60 times from 35 stations (38 charging points) in 2014 to 2054 stations (4069 charging points) as of the beginning of 2019.
Given the known in the spring of 2019, the exact number of charging stations and the latest statistics of the total number of electric vehicles in Ukraine (may 2019), the average per charging station in the country falls 8.6 cars with electric drive requiring battery charging (clean electric vehicles and plug-hybrids) or 4.3 electric cars per 1 charging point.
It is obvious that the statistics are constantly changing, at the beginning of the year the above figures were different — 7 electric vehicles per 1 charging station or 3.5 for each charging point.
Unfortunately, all this infrastructure is concentrated in large cities and is poorly represented on highways. This deprives them of the ability to travel, which is certainly a drawback of the use of electric cars in Ukraine.
Number of charging stations and charging points in Ukraine for 2019:
As you can see the number of electric vehicles in Ukraine is growing quite quickly and this trend will only increase. In such a situation in the future, it will be important not only the number of stations, but also the stability of their work, especially given the fact that there are ultra-fast charging stations capable of charging electric cars with a high speed of up to 350 kW.
It should be understood that even if charging stations in Ukraine become widespread, electricity suppliers will have to find a way to meet the demand for charging electric vehicles at unpredictable speeds and at different times, without causing disconnection or burnout of transformers, as well as network failures.
