Nepal dam-building spree powers electric vehicle boom

KATHMANDU

Taxi driver Surendra Parajuli's decision to buy an electric cab would have been unthinkable a decade ago, when chronic power cuts left Nepalis unable to light their homes at night.

But a dam-building spree has led to dirt-cheap energy prices in a landlocked Himalayan republic otherwise entirely dependent on fossil fuel imports, meaning the switch has put more money in his pocket.

"It has meant huge savings for me," said Parajuli, the proud new owner of a battery-powered and Chinese-made BYD Atto 3.

"It gives 300 kilometeres in a single charge and costs me a tenth of what petrol does.”

Kathmandu is ground zero of an incipient transport revolution set to see the clapped out cars that clog its traffic-snarled streets make way for emissions-free alternatives.

More than 40,000 electric vehicles are on the roads around the mountainous country, a small fraction of the 6.2 million motor vehicles currently in service.

But demand is insatiable: More than a quarter of those vehicles were imported in the 12 months to July, a near-threefold increase from the previous year.

Neighboring China, now the dominant player in electric vehicles globally, is supplying nearly 70 percent of the market.

More than four in five Nepalis did not have access to electricity at the turn of the century.

But rapid investment in dams, which generate 99 percent of Nepal's baseload power, has transformed the energy grid since.

Hydropower output has increased fourfold in the past eight years, while 95 percent of the population now has access to electricity.

The country has already signed deals to export surplus power to coal-dependent India and has its sights set on future revenues by raising its current 3,200 megawatts of installed power generation capacity to 30,000 megawatts over the next decade.

Making electricity universal, and universally cheap, has the potential to jumpstart an economy that has historically depended on remittances from Nepalis working abroad.

Kulman Ghising of the Nepal Electricity Authority told AFP that the benefits have already been felt by setting the favorable conditions for widespread electric vehicle adoption.

Nepal is entirely dependent on imports from India to meet its fossil fuel needs, imposing additional costs on motorists, but Ghising said curbs on demand had saved the country around $224 million.

"The EVs have great potential for us," he added. "EVs in India and Bangladesh need to depend on coal, but in Nepal, it's fully green energy," he said.

Road transport accounts for just over 5 percent of greenhouse gas emissions and has fuelled a worsening air pollution crisis.

Kathmandu was this year listed as one of the world's most polluted cities for several days in April.

Experts say that getting more petrol-powered vehicles off the road will be a major step towards alleviating that problem.