After IOC, Bharat Petroleum too promises EV chargers at its petrol pumps

Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) is set to follow Indian Oil Corporation in efforts to strengthen India's EV infrastructure. The oil company, which has over 19,000 petrol pumps across India, will now offer their space to set up EV charging points as well.

BPCL is betting big on electric vehicles in coming days. It has chalked out a plan to offer charging stations at around 7,000 petrol pumps over next few years. While strengthening India's EV infrastructure, this will also help BPCL with a new business opportunity in future.

Arun Kumar Singh, Chairman and Managing Director of Bharat Petroleum, said, "Over the next few years, we are aiming at reaching the count of 7,000 stations to support the growing EV industry and these stations would be known as 'Energy Stations'."

"EV charging infrastructure is one of the five focused segments that BPCL is working on along with Petchem, Gas, Consumer Retailing, Renewables & Biofuels that will serve the energy needs of the nation," he said.

BPCL's move comes close to the heels of Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) announcing that it will set up 10,000 EV charging stations at its petrol pumps across India in the next three years. On Wednesday, the oil company had announced that it will install 2,000 EV charging stations in the next 12 months and another 8000 in the next two years to achieve the target of 10,000 EV charging stations by 2024.

"Eventually we intend to become energy company of India and not just be restricted to selling petroleum products. The world is changing. We intend to set up EV charging points and battery swapping stations at our petrol pumps alongside offering auto-LPG and conventional fuels. So it will be a bouquet of offering," said Shrikant Madhav Vaidya, Chairman of Indian Oil Corporation.

Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) is India's second largest oil company with its refineries at Mumbai and Kochi. Besides the 19,000-odd petrol pumps, BPCL also has over 6,100 LPG distributorships, 733 Lubes distributorships, 123 POL storage locations, 54 LPG Bottling Plants, 64 Aviation Service Stations, 4 Lube blending plants and 4 cross-country pipelines.