Germany's path to electromobility: where many charging points are missing and where there is still a problem

Created: 12/22/2021, 06:11 AM

From: Cindy Boden

Electromobility in Germany: where there are already plenty of charging options - and where car drivers have to search for a long time.

© M. Litzka / Photo booth / Michael Gstettenbauer / Imago

Germany is to convert to e-cars, which will require a lot of charging points.

The expansion is progressing, but is it fast enough?

Here you can see how far your region is with the changeover.

Munich - Insufficient range and lack of charging options: According to surveys, prospective customers often have these two concerns in the back of their minds when they think about e-cars.

Billions of euros are being invested in electromobility, and a lot is developing further.

A data analysis by

shows where Germany is now - and where it still lacks.

More and more charging stations for electric cars in Germany: Are they enough?

First some positive news: The number of publicly accessible charging points in Germany * continues to rise.

On July 1, 2021, according to the Federal Network Agency (BNetzA), there were over 45,500 charging points that were registered and at which an electric car can charge at the same time.

But the number of charging points alone says little in itself.

It is more interesting how many electric cars have to share a space.

And many districts and cities are still far behind in terms of their ambitious goals.

VDA ranking on the charging network in Germany - How many cars share a charging point?

So what about charging options in Germany? In its current charging network ranking from the end of November, the Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA) compares how many electric cars are facing a publicly accessible charging point. The smaller the value per city or district, the better. Both a pure electric car and a plug-in hybrid with a combustion engine and an electric motor count as an electric car. On the other hand, the association looks at how many cars in total come to a charging point in a registration district. Above all, this value provides information about how attractive the charging infrastructure is for switching to an e-model.

The range of how many e-cars have to share a charging point is generally very large: the front-runner Salzgitter has around six vehicles, while the last-placed Offenbach am Main has 95. The EU Commission * gave a guideline value of a maximum of ten E for 2020 -Cars per public charging point: Not even ten percent of the regions examined currently achieve this recommendation.

According to the VDA, there are on average around 21 electric cars per publicly accessible charging point throughout Germany.

And the ratio has even worsened compared to April 2021. Lots of new e-cars, but too few new charging points.

Top region in the ranking, but still few electric cars on site?

However, some regions of the ranking cannot be compared with one another without restriction. In Munich, for example, many electric cars are commercially registered according to the VDA. The regional value is therefore only of limited significance because the vehicles may be traveling in completely different regions and using the local charging infrastructure. In the top regions, on the other hand, the number of e-cars is still quite small in some cases. Then just a few charging points are enough to do well in the ranking. But that's not in the interests of climate protection.

With the second value, where all cars are included in the calculation, the range is also considerable: In the Lower Saxony city of Wolfsburg there are 153 cars per charging point, in Neunkirchen in Saarland there are 5450 cars. The association states that cities are more in the forefront than rural regions - Wolfsburg, Ingolstadt, Passau, Regensburg and Heilbronn are particularly attractive. This also includes important locations for automobile manufacturers. In absolute terms, the range of public charging points in cities is usually greater because electric car drivers rarely have their own garage with a charging facility.

It is important to note with all this: An exact number for all e-charging points cannot be determined.

Because the Federal Network Agency only lists publicly accessible charging points that were put into operation from March 2016 and have a certain charging capacity.

All others will then be reported voluntarily.

E-cars in Germany: Significantly more new registrations

The decisive factor for the classification of all these values ​​is how many electric cars are already driving in a region.

According to the Federal Motor Transport Authority, there were over 516,000 pure electric cars in Germany as of October 1, 2021.

That is around one percent of all cars.

There are also around 494,000 plug-in hybrids.

And the numbers are increasing.

More and more people are opting for an all-electric car *.

This is clear from the new car registrations.

From January to October 2021, the share of electric cars in new registrations of all cars was around twelve percent.

Compared to this period in 2020, the number of new e-cars grew by around 120 percent.

E-mobility in Germany: East-West difference visible

In some places, however, it looks a lot worse than elsewhere when it comes to the number of electric cars.

Light areas on the map are particularly noticeable in the eastern federal states.

In the Oberspreewald-Lausitz district in the south of Brandenburg, for example, only every 156th car is an electric car.

There are more electric cars in the regions around Munich, Stuttgart, Frankfurt am Main and Düsseldorf.

In Wolfsburg, every 11th car is an electric car, and again many are commercially registered.

Traffic officer on charging stations for e-cars: "Very uneven expansion"

Similar results emerge with the number of charging options: "The expansion is very uneven," said Gregor Kolbe, traffic officer at the consumer

, in an interview with

It looks pretty good in large cities and on busy motorways, but worse in rural areas such as Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania or in parts of Lower Saxony. Despite progress, a lot still needs to be done in terms of the number of charging options.

The extent to which the expansion of the public infrastructure should proceed depends, among other things, on how many electric car drivers have private charging options. Because if you can charge your car at home, you need to go to a public charging point significantly less often. In other words, if there are many private charging stations, fewer public ones are needed. A study by the National Charging Infrastructure Control Center on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Transport examined several scenarios. In the end it came out: In 2030, depending on the development, the demand will be between at least 440,000 and 843,000 publicly accessible charging points. In the so-called charging infrastructure master plan of the old federal government, the goal of one million public charging points is even written.And how many e-cars should then be on the streets? According to the government, it should be 14 million.

Expansion of charging points for e-cars: Germany still has big plans

There is still a long way to go.

If the expansion of the charging points continued as between July 1, 2020 and July 1, 2021, even the stated minimum requirement of 440,000 charging points for 2030 would by far not be reached.

The following graphic shows how big the gap is - as a model under the condition that the expansion would proceed steadily.

So the current growth is by no means sufficient.

By 2030, however, technological advances could make up for any deficits.

For example, the focus will be on fast charging points: Compared to normal charging points, more cars can be charged in the same time.

Car manufacturers are also continuing to strive for greater ranges for e-cars.

Charging e-cars: consumer advice center points to problems

All the figures mentioned are intended to show where Germany is so far. Ultimately, however, it is also crucial for the driver in everyday life whether a station is free at all. However, for reasons of competition, the requested operators did not provide any data on how busy charging stations actually are, so this question remains open. There is also the problem that not all charging stations are suitable for everyone. Gregor Kolbe from the consumer advice center points this out. Sometimes the procedures to start the charging process are very complicated. Some stations are not part of the concluded charging contract, charging cards or apps are not accepted, charging may be expensive and the price cannot be viewed transparently in advance. The sheer number of charging options is only a first step.

Our data, sources and methods

The Federal Network Agency (BNetzA) publishes data on publicly accessible normal and fast charging points.

However, there are restrictions: normal charging points that were commissioned before March 17, 2016, when the charging station ordinance came into force, as well as charging points with up to 3.7 kW charging power are not covered by the obligation to notify.

How much the meaningfulness of the numbers is restricted and how large the number of unreported cases is cannot be clearly stated.

The Federal Network Agency also has no data on private charging points.

The results of the current charging network ranking of the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA) are based on data from the BNetzA and the Federal Motor Transport Authority from October 1, 2021. Weimar is not ranked per charging point in the official ranking of e-cars because there are many e-cars Car sharing providers give. The value is thus skewed upwards. In addition to the ratio of cars to charging points, the VDA also shows absolute numbers of e-car stocks and car stocks for the districts and cities. These values ​​were put into relation for each region in a map of Germany.

In order to calculate the extent to which the expansion of the charging infrastructure must precede the needs identified by the study by the National Charging Infrastructure Control Center (2020), half-yearly interim results were determined.

These are based on the condition that the same number of new public charging points are added every six months.