ELECTROMOBILITY: POLAND AND THE WORLD

Jerzy Czaplejewicz

To improve well-being, it should be recalled that Poland had ambitious plans for the production of electric vehicles about 50 years ago. In 1971 a factory producing four-wheel electric vehicles for golf courses and internal transport was launched in Mielec, under the name Melex. Before the so-called the transformation Melex had considerable export achievements and it still operates under this name in the minds of Polish golfers as a name for every golf cart. Golf carts are vehicles traveling at low speed and usually in enclosed spaces of golf courses. There are over 0.2 million of them in the world and this is a different story than common traffic.
According to the European Alternative Fuels Observatory, there are already (or only) 1.27 million passenger electric vehicles on Europe’s roads, which are served by 174,100 publicly accessible charging points. In Poland, there are about 7 000 passenger vehicles, nearly 400 vans and trucks, about 200 buses and over 5 200 electric scooters and motorbikes, and about 800 charging stations. Statistics are improved by scooters and electric bicycles.
The transition to “electrification” of propulsion and the promotion of electric vehicles plays an important role in reducing emissions and air pollution. Globally, progress in electromobility can help many countries achieve their overall climate change goals, such as those agreed at COP21 and those foreseen in the European Commission Green Deal announced in December 2019, which include that in order to achieve climate neutrality, a reduction of 90% in CO2 emissions from transport is needed by 2050. In fact, the transport sector is expected to provide a 60% reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the EU by 2050. It is expected that achieving COP21’s goal of limiting the temperature rise to 1.5 ° C / year will require a full “decarbonisation”of the transport sector by 2050 (Source: EAFO, 2017), which seems to be quite unreal.
The Polish government’s ambitious goal that in 2025 1 million electric vehicles drive Polish roads will also be difficult to achieve. The specially appointed state-owned company ElectroMobility Poland SA (shareholders are: PGE Polska Grupa Energetyczna SA, Energa SA, Enea SA and Tauron Polska Energia SA) as expected, it was to achieve this goal. Recently, however, it cut off from the 1 million electricians program in 2025 and declares that it is implementing it’s own program, which assumes the production of about 100,000 electricians annually from around 2023. I wish them good luck and implement even such plans.
Poland also has legitimate ambitions in the production of electric buses. According to the European Parliament, in 2025 half of the new city buses should have electric drive, and in 2030 electric buses are to account for 75% of purchases of urban centers. It is estimated that the electric bus market is expected to grow by 17%. Solaris is one of the leading European manufacturers. Autosan and Ursus factories, despite financial and organizational turmoil, also consistently focused on the development of electric bus production, and probably rightly so.
The vehicle industry with low-power electric drive is developing actively, mainly for closed communication (four-wheeled vehicles) and for individual communication (mainly scooters). The Melex factory, after it’s transformation, basically switched to the production of specialized electric vehicles for internal and tourist service. There are also several other companies involved in the production of reliable and attractive low-powered electric vehicles, including Tomax, Frugal and VELEX with plans for dynamic development in the light vehicle sector, including scooters, and with expansion into foreign markets.
Maybe these vehicles do not have a significant impact on the improvement of statistics, but they are important in terms of promoting an ecological approach to transport, and therefore they deserve all support.

Author: Jerzy Czaplejewicz
N-E-T expert, IB,NSINT