Accelerate the transition to electric vehicles
Faced with the trend of green transportation and the policy of promoting clean energy conversion, many taxi companies are accelerating the replacement of gasoline cars with electric cars to reduce emissions and improve service quality. The conversion not only helps businesses save fuel and maintenance costs but also creates a competitive advantage in the context of fluctuating gasoline prices. Customers are also increasingly prioritizing choosing electric taxis thanks to new cars, operating smoothly, without gasoline odors and environmentally friendly.
Talking to Lao Dong Newspaper, Mr. Nguyen Quoc Bien - Director of Phuc Thinh Joint Stock Company (Que Lua Taxi) said that the enterprise currently owns more than 400 taxis, of which about 300 are electric vehicles, equivalent to over 70% of the total number of vehicles. The enterprise plans to complete 100% conversion to electric vehicles by 2028, 2 years earlier than the general roadmap to 2030 of Hanoi City.
Assessing the effectiveness of the conversion, Mr. Nguyen Quoc Bien said that feedback from customers is very positive. Replacing gasoline cars with electric cars means that all vehicles are new, clean, operate smoothly, no longer smell of gasoline and oil, especially creating a comfortable feeling for passengers who often get motion sickness. Many customers also appreciate the business's efforts in green conversion, considering this a practical action accompanying the emission reduction goals of the Government and the city.
Besides advantages, the biggest difficulty currently is accessing preferential capital sources to invest in new vehicles. Although there is a policy to support businesses in green transformation, in reality, access to low-interest loan packages still faces many barriers. Therefore, businesses still have to borrow capital from commercial banks with high loan interest rates, creating no small financial pressure.
60% of taxis have switched to electric vehicles
On the management agency side, Mr. Nguyen Quang Huy - Deputy Head of Transport Management Department (Hanoi Department of Construction) - said that currently Hanoi Department of Construction is managing 14,375 taxis licensed, of which up to 8,992 vehicles have converted to electric vehicles, accounting for about 60%. There are about 13,600 vehicles waiting to be replaced and the total number of vehicles that need to be converted by 2030 is 27,975 vehicles.
The Department of Construction has also chaired and coordinated with the Hanoi Taxi Association as well as taxi business units, 65 taxi business units in the city, to meet and implement according to the roadmap of the City People's Committee, ensuring the goal that by the end of 2030, all Hanoi taxis will switch to electric vehicles and environmentally friendly energy, in order to improve the air and contribute to reducing emissions.
According to Mr. Nguyen Quang Huy, this transformation also ensures the harmony of interests between the State, businesses and people with a number of solutions.
The first solution is that we are advising the City People's Council to develop a resolution on converting fossil fuel vehicles to clean energy. In that Resolution, there are also many solutions to support business units, including solutions on loan interest and interest rate support, and then support for charging station business units. The second is also to offer preferential parking fees for electric vehicles. The third is to synchronously develop charging stations according to the planning of the Capital and transportation in general. Regarding the application of management technology, we have also developed a set of criteria to rank taxis and regularly evaluate the rate of electric taxis, apply technology for operation, and build a common data system" - Mr. Huy informed.
