A rather dismal picture actually as it’s the only time I’ve ever seen a study where it costs more to operate an electric car versus a diesel one! In theory if the rural charging points costs were close to their metro counterparts it would be far cheaper.
Good to see we have an interactive map (not sure it covers all possible charging stations though) but a good many stations are shown as offline. So although EVs are making very good sense in some other countries already, I fear it is far too early still for South Africa. We can also expect government to start taxing charging points as there is a heavy petrol and diesel levy already, which is lost to government when users switch to electric.
I’m probably the least optimistic ever right now about EV in South Africa. It’s clear that EV is where the world is already going and it is making much sense especially in Europe, and we are seeing good movements with cheaper EV starting to be produced too.
For South Africa though we are pretty well much in the Dark Ages still with EV. We also have one of the few (only?) utility companies which is actively discouraging its consumers to buy its electricity (unlike other parts of Africa).
So the EV revolution in Africa is starting to take place within Ethiopia and Nigeria…
See What it costs to drive across South Africa in an electric car
We calculated how long it would take and how much it would cost to drive a Jaguar i-Pace from Cape Town to Musina.