The total number of registered electric vehicles (EV) in Bulgaria increased by 82% in 12 months till July 1, reaching 4,614.
There was a 58 percent year-on-year rise in plug-in hybrid cars to 25,467, with 21,842 of using utilising a mixture of petrol and electricity.
The rise in Electric Vehicles in Bulgaria is in line with upwards trends around Europe, where electric vehicle registrations in the year 2020 rose to 1,325,000 from 550,000 in 2019, as per the information on the 27-member bloc plus Iceland, UK and Noway as issued by a European Environment Agency in late 2021.
Recently, in June, the European Parliament approved the Commission’s proposition to ban internal combustion engines in European Union car fleets from 2035 as part of its plan to get carbon-free road transport in the bloc.
As per a proposal made by the Commission in July 2021, targets would be scheduled to lessen emissions around the EU to 55% for cars and 50% for vans from the year 2030 to ease the implementation of the Green Deal.
During early 2022, Bulgaria’s state-run Electricity System Operator (ESO) signed a MOC (memorandum of cooperation) with the association of Bulgarian municipalities, the energy industry chamber, electric vehicles industrial cluster EVIC, the association of the electric vehicle BAEPS and the EV owners’ association, which anticipates the installation of good national EV charging infrastructure, non-governmental organisation Bulgarian Energy and Mining Forum started in March.
The aim of Bulgaria will be to install 10,000 EV charge points in the next five years, said the NGO at the time, adding that the state of the infrastructure, potential geographical locations and the economic parameters of the needed infrastructure resources are yet to be explored.