Speaking at the recent IAA car show in Munich, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced a new push to expand the number of public EV charging stations in his country.

Scholz said that Germany will become “the first country in Europe to introduce a law requiring operators of 80% of all service stations to provide fast charging options with at least 150 kilowatts [of charging power] for e-cars.”

The Chancellor offered no details and no time frame for the plan. At this writing, we’ve heard no other news about the initiative, and it’s not clear whether it represents pending legislation or merely a proposal at this point.

According to Reuters, Germany currently has some 1.2 million pure EVs on its Strassen, and around 90,000 public charging points—the country aims to have a million charging points by 2030.

The chancellor’s tour of the car show was interrupted twice by protesters climbing on top of cars and shouting about the dangers of climate change. “Protests are part of public and democratic debate,” said Scholz, “but it is a little anachronistic. If you walk through these stands and see the new technologies to make mobility have less or no emissions in future, it is a bit irritating. We can increase our well-being with great products, and they will be carbon-neutral.”

Scholz also addressed fears that China is eating Germany’s electric lunch: “Competition should spur us on, not scare us. In the 1980s, it was said that Japanese cars would overrun the market. Twenty years later it was cars made in Korea, and now supposedly Chinese electric cars.” He asserted that the competitiveness of German carmakers is “beyond doubt.”

Source: Reuters