NITI Aayog has released the draft battery swapping policy.The policy aims to support the vision of catalysingthe large-scale adoption of electric vehicles (EVs), by promoting the adoption of battery swapping technology implemented via battery as a service (BaaS) business models which will ensure lower upfront costs, minimal downtime, and lower space requirements.
The policy addresses key technical, regulatory, institutional, and financing challenges that will help develop battery swapping ecosystems to unlock the large-scale adoption of battery swapping in India.The policy stipulates the minimum technical and operational requirements that battery swapping ecosystems would need, highlights the possible ways to provide direct and indirect financial supportto battery providers and EV users, lays down an institutional framework to facilitate on-ground implementation of the required battery-swapping infrastructure, among others.The target vehicle segments for battery swapping are electric two-wheeler (e-2W) and three-wheeler (e-3W), which are heavily concentrated in urban areas. The rollout of battery swapping stations be in phased manner. All metropolitan cities with a population greater than 4 million will be prioritised for development of battery swapping networks under the first phase, while all major cities such as state capitals, union territory headquarters and cities with population greater than 0.5 million will be covered under the second phase.The stakeholders have been requested to submit their comments latest by June 5, 2022.