Galp and the Oeiras City Council have taken yet another step towards decarbonisation. The first ultra-rapid charging point in Portugal was installed in Algés almost three years ago, and in early November this year the two entities concluded the installation of the last two of a total of 42 charging points, next to the Galp service station on Avenida da República, in Oeiras, as part of the tender process launched by the city council in 2020. The public electric charging network in the city of Oeiras has thereby been reinforced and prepared for the future.
This pioneering electric mobility partnership between Galp and Oeiras is not new. The first charging point was installed on a European motorway in 2010. It was on the A5 (Lisbon-Cascais), an event that marked Portugal as the first country in Europe to do so, and one of three, worldwide, to place the first mass-produced totally electric car on the market, a feat that marked the beginning of a new era in mobility towards energy transition.
Isaltino Morais and Nuno Bonneville highlighted the strategy implemented by the city of Oeiras towards reducing the consumption of fossil fuels
A study published by MOBI.E, the managing entity of the Electric Mobility Network, predicts that more than 9,000 charging points will have been installed by 2025 and more than 76,000 by 2050, a total of more than 80,000 points.
The goal is to respond to the growing number of BEV [100% electric vehicles] + PHEV [plug-in hybrid] electric cars on the roads. In the first nine months of this year alone, almost 50,000 units were sold in Portugal, and one in every five passenger vehicles purchased in September was 100% electric. It is worth noting that, and according to data from ACAP – Associação Automóvel de Portugal (Portuguese Automobile Association) and IMT – Instituto da Mobilidade e dos Transportes (Institute of Transport and Mobility), sales of 100% electric vehicles have grown exponentially since 2020, rising from 8,137 to 20,230 units in 2022.
Moreover according to the same study, “Charging Infrastructure to Support the Energy Transition of Mobility in Portugal”, the points scheduled for installation by 2050 will ensure additional savings of 3.3 million tons of CO2, representing an economic benefit of around 1.9 billion euros. This value, per se, will offset the investment costs, which will come to around 1.5 billion euros.
With around 3,400 electric charging stations now in operation and the goal of 10,000 points available in the Iberian Peninsula by the end of 2025, Galp has consolidated its place on the electric mobility map.
Oeiras leading the way
According to Nuno Bonneville, director of Electric Mobility at Galp, the project conducted in partnership with Oeiras has also given the city international prestige as one of the best examples in Portugal: “We have the highest density of chargers in the country”. Furthermore, he states that more than 880,000 litres of fuel have been saved and over 2,000 tons of CO2 prevented from being released into the atmosphere since the project was first implemented. Mobility is and always will be a priority for Galp, a company that is “making considerable efforts to achieve energy transition”, he concludes.
The two new ultra-rapid charging points in Oeiras are the last of a total of 42 installed as part of a tender process launched in 2020
The Mayor of Oeiras, Isaltino Morais, also believes that the completion of the work to install electric chargers in the city is a reflection of all the efforts to reduce the consumption of fossil fuels. “The execution of such initiatives in different areas proves that we have a strategy to minimise the effects of climate change. This is what we are preparing the infrastructure, region and people for”.
“The execution of such initiatives in different areas proves that we have a strategy to minimise the effects of climate change”
The two ultra-rapid charging points installed, with a power of 180 kW each, enable four cars to be “supplied” with energy simultaneously in around 20 minutes.
