China ramps up installation of charging poles to meet demand

Analysts say the move is to boost new energy vehicle sales in world's largest car market

China is calling for more efforts to build charging poles for electric vehicles, which are expected to alleviate concern about mileage capacity and boost the country's new energy vehicle market that has shown signs of a slowdown.

At a meeting last week, the country's top officials said that China will step up efforts to push forward a new infrastructure campaign. The campaign covers seven fields including 5G, artificial intelligence and charging poles.

China had 1.24 million charging poles, both private and public, by the end of January 2020, according to the country's charging infrastructure promotion alliance.

That was up 45.8 percent compared to a year ago, but it still lagged far behind the number of new energy vehicles.

Last year, sales of new energy vehicles totaled 1.21 million, down 4 percent year-on-year, according to statistics from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.

Despite the first dip in a decade, that brought the total number of electric cars and plug-in hybrids on the country's roads to 3.85 million, which means that three vehicles has only one pole for their use.

According to 2015 guidelines from the National Development and Reform Commission, China is expected to ensure that every new energy vehicle will have a pole by the end of 2020.

Thomas Fang, a partner of consulting firm Roland Berger's China office, who focuses on the automotive industry, said "Setting charging facilities as a priority will bolster the charging infrastructure market and sales of new energy vehicles in the country."

Fang warned that the country's charging pole builders and operators, ranging from power suppliers to carmakers, should be well-coordinated to ensure they play their roles in a constructive way.

China once had hundreds of such companies, but many failed to profit as authorities focused on electric vehicles.

By the end of 2018, only 15 companies operated more than 1,000 charging poles, according to Leqing, a Chinese think tank.

The year 2019 saw some changes for the better. By the end of last December, the number of companies operating 1,000 charging poles grew to 22, and the top 5 accounted for more than 80 percent of the total.

About 180,000 public charging poles were built across the country last year, bringing the total to 516,000.