Special attention is paid to the | the dilemma of electric vehicle charging difficulties is expected to be solved

Recently, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development solicited opinions from the public on the Specifications for Residential Projects (Draft for Solicitation of Comments) (hereinafter referred to as the Draft for Comments). The "Draft for Comments" requires that for supporting facilities, residential projects should be equipped with motor vehicle parking lots; the number of supporting parking spaces should be comprehensively determined according to the local level of motorized development, the location of the residential project, the land use and the public transportation conditions, and at the same time, new energy vehicle charging facilities should be configured or reserved installation conditions.

The "Rule of Law Daily" reporter learned that the "Draft for Comments" involves residential living environment, building space, structural safety, indoor environment, building equipment and other aspects, some standards have been upgraded compared with the current standards, responding to the higher demand of the majority of residents for a better living life, of which the relevant provisions on the problem of "charging difficulties" of electric vehicles are particularly eye-catching.

Private charging piles cannot be built

The owner was too late to pick up the car

Ms. Meng, who works for a state-owned enterprise in Beijing, has recently been very upset, she bought a Tesla electric car at the end of last year, because the property in the community where she lived rejected or prevaricated her application for "building a private charging pile in the parking space" for various reasons, making her hesitant to pick up the car, and now she is ready to sell the car at a discount.

In recent years, the production and sales of electric vehicles in the mainland have both increased significantly, but the problem of "charging pile shortage" that plagues the development of electric vehicles has always been an obstacle that cannot be avoided. Although the state has introduced various policies to support new energy vehicles, cases of car owners building charging piles in the community are often reported.

In addition to Ms. Meng above, Mr. An, who lives in Xicheng, Beijing, is also fed up with the "nest gas" to charge his car. Mr. An's community does not object to him building charging piles, but stipulates that the money for burying the underground cable is paid by the owner himself, 100 yuan per meter, and the money for the cable alone is more than 10,000 yuan. In desperation, he had to buy a wire of more than 100 meters and two sockets with metering, and "flying line charging" from the seventh floor where he lived every day.

In order to solve the problem of "charging difficulties" of electric vehicles in the community, Beijing has introduced a number of measures to require property owners to build charging piles. As early as 2014, the Beijing Municipal Development and Reform Commission, the Municipal Science and Technology Commission, and the Municipal Finance Bureau issued the "Beijing Demonstration Application of New Energy Passenger Car Charging Facilities Construction Management Rules" and "Beijing Demonstration Application of New Energy Passenger Car Financial Subsidy Fund Management Rules", which detailed the construction process, charging costs and financial subsidies for self-use charging facilities, and clearly pointed out that residential properties and industry committees should support and cooperate with the construction of charging facilities.

The Draft for Comments clearly states that residential projects should be equipped with motor vehicle parking lots; at the same time, new energy vehicle charging facilities should be configured or reserved installation conditions.

It is understood that in order to adapt to the international technical regulations and technical standards, since 2016, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development has proposed a work plan for the government to formulate mandatory standards and social groups to formulate voluntary adoption standards, and has clarified the reform plan to gradually replace the scattered mandatory provisions in the current standards with full-text mandatory engineering construction specifications, and gradually formed a "technical regulations" system composed of technical provisions in laws, administrative regulations, departmental rules and full-text mandatory engineering construction specifications.

In this regard, Xiong Wenzhao, a professor at the Law School of the Central University for Nationalities, analyzed and pointed out: "After the implementation of the mandatory engineering construction specifications, the mandatory provisions in the current national standards and industry standards for relevant engineering construction will be abolished at the same time. The mandatory provisions in the current local standards for engineering construction shall be revised in a timely manner and shall not be lower than the provisions of the mandatory engineering construction specifications. Once the above provisions of the Draft for Comments are implemented, the configuration of new energy vehicle charging facilities or reserved installation conditions in residential areas will be a mandatory construction engineering specification requirement, which will also greatly reduce the phenomenon of ridicule and prevarication in the construction process. ”

Charging facilities are severely inadequate

Restrict the development of electric vehicles

At present, the mainland has become the world's largest new energy vehicle market. Among new energy vehicles, pure electric vehicles have received the most preferential treatment from government policies in the past few years and have become the largest segment of the new energy vehicle market. However, the inconvenience of energy replenishment has also become the biggest constraint on the development of the current electric vehicle industry, which is mainly manifested in the serious shortage of charging infrastructure, too long waiting and charging time, and uneven distribution of charging facilities.

According to data released by the China Commercial Industry Research Institute, as of December 31, 2020, less than 25% of households in first-tier cities have parking spaces that can install household charging piles, so a large number of pure electric vehicle owners have to rely on public charging infrastructure, while the ratio of new energy vehicle ownership to public charging piles is 6.1:1.

It is understood that public charging piles can be divided into slow charging piles and fast charging piles. At present, fast charging piles account for only 38.3% of the total number of public charging piles, and the ratio of new energy vehicle ownership to public fast charging piles is 15.9:1. In general, the time required for a full charge of a public fast charging pile is generally 30 to 60 minutes. Public slow charging piles take hours to fully charge the pure electric vehicle battery. Coupled with searching, long distances and waiting in line, car owners will actually spend more time.

The main distribution of electric vehicle charging piles in large cities such as Beijing is public underground parking lots, residential areas and office areas, gas stations or highway service areas, while there is a serious shortage of charging piles and queues around places such as schools and hospitals with large traffic flow.

It is urgent to promote the construction of charging facilities in residential areas, but the obstacles cannot be ignored.

A staff member of Mr. An's residential property told reporters that the installation of home charging piles is not profitable for the property, and it is necessary to increase the workload, so most properties have a mentality of "more is better than less". At the same time, the installation and use of charging piles also need to bear the corresponding responsibility, if it is the owner's personal parking space, the property must bear the responsibility for safety risks; if it is a common parking space or rented in the community, it is necessary to seek the opinions of other owners, so it is often not done.

In addition, the complicated procedures also make operators very headaches. Some charging pile operation enterprises showed reporters a charging pile construction application business process table, including electricity application, determination of the plan, engineering design, engineering construction, completion acceptance, meter connection and other processes. Among them, it takes about 15 working days to determine the plan, about 10 working days for engineering design, about 5 working days for engineering acceptance, about 5 working days for metering and power connection, and the whole process theoretically takes at least 35 working days, while the actual waiting time is longer.

Improve service assurance capabilities

Open up the "last mile"

All along, the mainland has vigorously supported the construction of charging facilities.

In 2012, the State Council issued the "Energy-saving and New Energy Vehicle Industry Development Plan (2012-2020)", proposing to "actively promote the construction of charging facilities". In September 2015, the General Office of the State Council issued the Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Construction of Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure, which for the first time clarified the policy direction of the charging pile industry. At the end of 2018, the National Development and Reform Commission, the National Energy Administration, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Ministry of Finance jointly issued a notice on the Action Plan for Improving the Charging Guarantee Capacity of New Energy Vehicles, requiring further increased support for the innovation of charging facilities operation mode, guiding local financial subsidies from supplementary purchase to supplementary operation, and gradually shifting local financial purchase subsidies to supporting the construction and operation of charging infrastructure, the use and operation of new energy vehicles, and other links.

With the support of the central government's favorable policies, many local governments in the mainland have also introduced charging pile construction plans or related subsidy policies, which has promoted the development of charging infrastructure construction to a certain extent, and the construction of public charging piles has achieved obvious results. However, the construction of charging piles in residential areas in the private sector has encountered a lot of resistance.

Liu Junhai, a professor at the Law School of Chinese Min University, believes that as the "last kilometer" of charging pile construction, the construction of charging piles in the community is ostensibly a matter between the property and the owner, but in fact, the property is limited by its duties and cannot solve all the problems faced in the construction process. Therefore, in order to allow the new energy vehicle charging pile to smoothly enter the community, it is necessary for the relevant government departments to cooperate, take the initiative to intervene, and make a difference in laws, policies and supervision in order to solve the dilemma. For example, local government departments should supervise and urge properties to take the initiative to serve owners through laws, regulations and policies, and minimize the resistance of owners and enterprises to build charging piles. At the same time, the government should take the initiative to coordinate enterprises, especially power enterprises, according to the actual situation and needs, and constantly promote the transformation and upgrading of power infrastructure, encourage communities and enterprises to be good at using big data, artificial intelligence and other technologies, carry out refined management, avoid the repeated construction of charging piles, and ensure the balanced distribution and efficient use of charging piles.

In view of the difficulty of building piles in residential communities, on January 10, 2022, the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments jointly issued the "Implementation Opinions on Further Improving the Service Guarantee Capacity of Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure", requiring residential community management units and owners' committees such as properties to actively cooperate and support to clear obstacles for the construction of piles in residential communities, and clarify the requirements for the construction and installation of charging piles in existing residential communities and new residential communities, providing a basis for subsequent work.

Xiong Wenzhao believes that with the continuous popularization of new energy vehicles, the call for charging piles to enter the community may be more and more. As long as the government listens to the voices of enterprises and consumers extensively, takes the initiative to open up the obstruction on the road to the construction of charging piles to the greatest extent, and makes charging piles become the standard for infrastructure like water, electricity and gas, then the charging dilemma of new energy vehicles will be expected to be completely solved.

Source: Rule of Law Daily