The 180 taxi ranks are filling up with charging stations

Of Foti Fotinos

One of the most important conditions for the success of the “Moving Electric” program, which launched its second cycle on Thursday, July 28, is the renewal of the vehicle fleet of companies and professionals.

The largest professional groups include the owners of Public Passenger Vehicles, i.e. taxi owners, for whom the program in question contains separate provisions.

To taxi owners, the subsidy reaches 17,500 euros and the withdrawal bonus to 5,000 euros.

Currently, professional motorists have not responded to the scheme, as the two years of the pandemic (2020 – 21) took a significant hit on their income.

With the aim of attracting more taxi owners to the program, the co-competent ministries, in addition to increasing the subsidy, are also proceeding with another improvement action.

After mapping the taxi parking spots (180 taxi ranks are estimated), electric vehicle charging stations will be created in their entirety.

The procedures for granting them to private individuals are progressing, so that fast chargers with special tariffs can be installed.

It is noted that the replacement of the taxi fleet is considered necessary, as their average age is close to 13 years.

It is noted that regarding the results of the first cycle of the “Move Electric” program, within 16 months, 19,000 enrollments in the program were implemented.

Of these, 12,937 were bicycles representing 68.5%. There were 4,095 registrations for two-wheelers, with the main volume concerning private individuals and the remaining percentage for transport companies, while for cars (purely electric, but also PHEV) registrations were 1,850.

Electric car registrations in Greece

According to SEAA, rechargeable BEV – PHEV cars accounted for 6.9% of total registrations in 2021, compared to 2.6% in 2020 and 0.5% in 2019, mainly due to the adoption of incentives by the State.

In absolute numbers, 6,967 plug-in cars were registered in 2021 compared to 2,135 in 2020 (2,178 electric compared to 679 in 2020 and 190 in 2019 and 4,789 hybrids compared to 1,456 in 2020 and 290 in 2019).

In the first six months of 2022, the share of BEV – PHEV plug-in vehicles reached 7.5%, with SEAA estimating that nearly 8,000 plug-in cars will be registered this year.

However, compared to other countries in Europe, Greece lags behind in the penetration rate of electrification, as in Europe the registrations of rechargeable cars moved in the first six months of the year to 18.8%.