All gas stations in Russia must install electric charger

Last week, the Russian government decided that filling stations across the country must offer charging stations for electric cars within a year. Currently there are only a few hundred electric cars in Russia, but the measure should change that.

Gas stations have until November 1, 2016 to install the electric charging facilities, writes The Moscow Times. Moscow wants to stimulate the production and use of electric vehicles with this. So far, that usage has been extremely low: according to the Russian research company Autostat, only 500 have been sold nationwide, including 49 EL Ladas from the Russian manufacturer AutoVAZ. Prices are high and critics say the cars cannot withstand the country’s weather conditions.

One of the other problems is the lack of infrastructure. There are now some charging stations in Moscow, spread across the city, but there are only dozens that charge slowly. The filling stations will soon have to pay for the costs of installing the charging stations themselves. The cheapest charging station, with which charging can take up to 9 hours, costs 100,000 rubles, converted 1310 euros. A fast charger in the country soon costs 46,000 euros, according to the newspaper.