TN to amend building bylaws to make way for charging of e-vehicles at home

CHENNAI: After unveiling the electric vehicle policy, Tamil Nadu is planning to amend the model building by-laws under Development Control Regulations to create infrastructure for electric vehicle charging infrastructure.

Industries department sources said that the idea is to ensure that charging infrastructure for electric vehicles is integrated at the planning stage itself for all new constructions and apartments.

Industries Department sources said that the Housing secretary will be intimated to bring in changes to the building and construction laws.

According to the policy which was unveiled on Monday by the Chief Minister, all existing associations with 50 plus families will be encouraged to provide charging points in parking lots.

Similarly, existing residential townships with 500 plus families will be encouraged to instal charging stations. meanwhile, commercial buildings such as hotels, shopping malls, cinema halls, apartments will need to allocate 10pc parking space for electric vehicles. They should also set up charging stations in the earmarked space.

It is learnt that based on available charging technologies and their evolution, type of vehicles, the types of chargers, decision will be taken on number of charging points required for setting up adequate Public Charging Stations within the local urban areas including the building premises of all building types and with the long term vision of implementing 'electric mobility' during the next 30 years.

This also comes after Centre unveiled its Guidelines on Electric Vehicle Charging infrastructure which was proposed to be implemented in nine cities having four million-plus population, including Chennai, under the first phase. Other cities included are Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Surat and Pune.

The home private chargers are generally used with 230V/15A single phase plug which can deliver a maximum of up to about 2.5KW of power. For charging outside the home premises, electric power needs to be billed and payment needs to be collected. The power drawn by these chargers may need to be managed from time to time.

However, as electric vehicles may be required to charge at homes, charging Infrastructures to the proposed set of building types of the Indian cities will require enhanced Power Load for each such building type.

As per the guidelines, the location of a public charging station is planned to be made available in a grid of 3km X 3km with one charging station to be set up at every 25km on both sides of highways or roads. The state nodal agency will fix the ceiling of the service charges to be charged by public charging stations.

S Sridharan, chairman of Confederation of Real Estate Developers Association of India, Tamil Nadu, hailed the electric vehicle policy of the state government and said that the government should now come
out with guidelines on how much space is required for the charging station in flats. It is learnt that the electricity board has sought a large amount of space even in smaller buildings and negotiation is being held with developers and officials. "The housing department and industries department should negotiate on how much space should be allocated so that it will easier for developers to allocate space before starting their new projects," he said.