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NITI Aayog: Feedback on Draft Battery Swapping Policy
NITI Aayog: Feedback on Draft Battery Swapping Policy

June 3, 2022

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During Budget 2022-2023, the government announced plans to introduce a Battery Swapping Policy and interoperability standards, with the intent of building and improving the efficiency of the battery swapping ecosystem, thereby driving EV adoption. To further this, the NITI Aayog had published a consultation paper on the draft batter swapping policy. (read more here)

In response to the consultation paper, we submitted our feedback to the NITI Aayog on draft Battery Swapping Policy. Our key recommendations include:

  1. Batteries with higher range

While we agree with the focus on set of recommendations in Para 5 of the Policy i.e., greater need of standardisation while ensuring room for innovation, we would recommend that the government may, at the same time, consider encouraging batteries with higher range i.e., approximately 80-100KMs per swap.

This is because for the initial phase of implementation of the Policy, battery swap dock availability will hinder adoption amongst EV users. Since the docks available across cities will be limited, users will need a higher range on batteries to be able to travel longer distances without having to take detours to find a battery swap dock.

  1. Separate metered connection in BaaS company’s name

It needs to be noted that the Baas companies, in some cases, will not be leasing space directly. They will be working with principals like e-commerce companies who will be running operations at a site and the property lease will be in name of the e-commerce company. Currently, electricity boards allow application for a meter and input power, only if the property lease is in the name of the BaaS company. However, allowing separate metered connection for battery docks set-up in premises of other companies will allow BaaS companies to a) address their principal need to enhance power load; and b) to avail subsidised power input, if any.

  1. Billing practices to be followed by Battery as a service (BaaS) companies

Para 5.4 of the Policy provides for battery charging and swapping infrastructure. However, it is not clear how pricing for swaps will work. For instance, as per industry inputs, we have been informed that battery range shown on EV odometers is unpredictable. Therefore, due to range anxiety, EV users may swap batteries with 20-30% charge left.

To address this, BaaS providers will need to build capability to calculate energy remaining in batteries, and charge users only for the units consumed. It may be worth considering to explore KWh usage billing practices for this.

  1. Number of contact cycles for swap batteries to be defined

We have been informed by the industry that due to repeated connection and disconnection of batteries, their contacts can wear off. This, along with prolonged usage, may lead to sparking and other safety hazards.

These connectors and contacts need to be proven to operate over 10,000 cycles at least to ensure that they survive longer than usable life of batteries.

You can read our detailed submission here. For more information, kindly write to apurva@nasscom.in or tejasvi@nasscom.in.


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BatterySwappingPolicy_VI_30052022.pdf

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Apurva Singh
Senior Policy Associate

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