With the opening of a new era of electric vehicles (EV), Vietnam plans to promote the use of green electricity for all vehicles by 2050, and plans to set up a large number of charging stations, igniting a huge potential of investment opportunities.
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh approved an action programme on green energy transformation in July to reduce carbon and methane emissions from the transport sector. According to the plan, from 2025, all buses in Vietnam must be EV or use green fuels; by 2030, they must run on electricity or green fuels; and by 2050, all vehicles should use electricity or green energy.
Starting from 2023, enterprises will accelerate the development of Vietnam's EV market. Vietnam’s TMT launched the mini electric model Wuling Hongguang, Vietnam’s Hyundai Thanh Cong launched the Ioniq 5, and VinFast introduced a series of new models, namely VF3, VF6 and VF7, which are manufactured and assembled in this country. It is expected that more EVs will be seen in the Vietnamese auto market in the near future.
BMI Research, a unit of credit ratings firm Fitch Solutions, predicts that EV sales in Vietnam will double to 18,000 in 2023. It is estimated that the market will grow by 25.8% per year during 2023-2032, and annual sales will increase from 8,400 in 2022 to 65,000.
The Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers Association (VAMA) also predicts that by 2030, there will be about 1 million electric vehicles on the road in Vietnam, increasing to 3.5 million by 2040.
The development of EV will require the development of charging stations, which presents a huge opportunity for investors. Currently, there are two companies in Vietnam that provide charging station services—VinFast and EVIDA, both providing EBOOST smart charging products.
VinFast plans to install 150,000 charging stations across the country, with a charging cost of 3,210.9 VND/kWh (approximately 0.13 USD), while the service price provided by EVIDA is 8,900 VND/kWh (approximately 0.37 USD), excluding activation fees: 4,900 VND for motorcycles and 19,900 VND for cars each time. The current charging fee in Southeast Asia is about 8,000 VND/kWh.
According to some business calculations, an electric car with 5 to 7 seats needs 15 kWh to travel 100 kilometers. If a charging station powers 100 vehicles for 200 kilometers per day, it can sell 3,000 kWh of electricity.
Based on the current price in Southeast Asia (8,000 VND/kWh), a power station can earn 24 million VND (approximately 1,008 USD), or 720 million VND a month, which is a huge profit. Even if a station can only achieve 30%-50% of the calculation, it will not suffer losses.
Recognizing this potential, many domestic and foreign companies also plan to enter the industry. Currently, Vietnam Electricity is installing charging stations in Hanoi and some other locations. In addition, it has also attracted the attention of industry leaders such as Siemens and ABB.
