The government of Tokyo, Japan, is looking to aggressively increase the number of chargers for electric vehicles in its apartment buildings in the coming years. To do that, it is raising incentives for developers as it mandates their installation.
Starting in 2025, Tokyo will become the first place in Japan to require that all new apartment towers feature EV chargers, reports Nikkei. In all, new buildings will have to offer charging at 20 percent of parking spaces.
Ultimately, the city aims to increase the number of chargers at apartments to 60,000 by 2030. That’s a staggering 150-fold increase over the most recent figure of just 393 at the end of fiscal year 2021.
Read: Installing EV Charging Infrastructure In Condos And Apartments Remains A Huge Challenge
Japan has been slower than Europe, the U.S., and China to adopt electric vehicles, making the installation of infrastructure for them hard to agree to for buildings. With roughly 70 percent of Tokyo’s population living in apartments (or similar housing complexes), installing more chargers in buildings will be a crucial step in incentivizing their adoption.
To do that, Tokyo has raised 4 billion yen ($29,248,640 USD at current exchange rates) in funding for this measure for its 2023 budget. This year and next, it hopes to see an additional 3,100 chargers installed at apartment buildings around the city. That’s an estimated 15 times more than were installed in 2022.
In addition, the Japanese national government offers incentives of 50 percent of the cost of EV chargers (up to 350,000 yen/$2,559 USD), and 100 percent of the installation cost (up to 1.35 million yen/$9,871 USD), and it is considering expanding that further in 2023.
That assistance, in addition to the incentives being offered by Tokyo, could cover the total cost of installation for developers, in some cases.
