"Ministry of Environment Revises Subsidy System
to Promote Spread of Battery Swap Electric Two-Wheelers"
The Korean government has revamped its subsidy system to promote the spread of battery swap electric two-wheelers. The Ministry of Environment revealed the guidelines for the electric two-wheeler subsidy project, which will be applied this year, on their official website on the 28th.
This year's guidelines focus on promoting battery swap electric two-wheelers, which replace used batteries with charged ones at exchange stations instead of charging them. The Ministry of Environment has made it possible to receive a subsidy equivalent to 60% of the cost of an electric two-wheeler, including the battery, when only the body of a battery swap electric two-wheeler is purchased. In this case, a battery subscription service must be used for a mandatory operation period of two years.
Battery swap electric two-wheelers are relatively free from the typical disadvantages of electric two-wheelers, such as 'short driving distance and long charging time'. Currently, the driving distance of electric two-wheelers per charge is 70-80km, which is less than a third of that of gasoline-powered two-wheelers (about 300km).
This year, a new standard for subsidies for 'other types of electric two-wheelers', such as three-wheelers, has also been established. Originally, electric two-wheeler subsidies were classified and paid according to light, small, medium, and large types, but other types were tied to large types, leading to criticisms that they received excessively more subsidies than general types.
According to this year's guidelines, the upper limit of the electric two-wheeler subsidy is 1.4 million KRW for light types, 2.3 million KRW for small types, 2.7 million KRW for medium and other types, and 3 million KRW for large types.
The 'climbing performance', which looks at how well a two-wheeler climbs a hill, has been changed to consider the gross vehicle weight when differentiating subsidies based on it. This is to prevent companies from focusing solely on lightening electric two-wheelers and neglecting safety.
From this year, small business owners and vulnerable groups can receive an additional 10% of the electric two-wheeler subsidy. Also, regarding the allocation of 10% of the subsidy to delivery electric two-wheelers, it was previously recognized as purchasing a delivery electric two-wheeler only when 'commercial transportation insurance' was subscribed for more than 6 months, but from this year, it is also recognized when 'non-commercial transportation insurance' is subscribed for more than 3 months.
The current cumulative supply of electric two-wheelers is 62,917 units. The Ministry of Environment aims to increase the cumulative supply of electric two-wheelers to 40,000 units by this year, and to achieve this, it will invest 32 billion KRW in subsidy support, which is a 78% increase from last year.