“From 2020 to date, the sale of electrically pure vehicles has increased by 5, but at the same time we have more than 7 thousand plug-in hybrids and electric trucks and buses continue to be added,” said the director of Electrical Energy of the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Mining (MIEM), Christian Nieves.
On the other hand, he highlighted the country’s position compared to another regarding the electric mobility. “Uruguay It is very good and is cutting edge not only in electric mobility, but also in everything related to the energy transition, which is why it is located in very important places,” commented Nieves.
The battery problem
The electric cars They use high-capacity lithium batteries, which have improved their technology over time. However, the MIEM representative assured that “it is not the same for a firefighter to attend to a common fire or a lithium battery fire: it has different consequences and implications and all these trainings have been supported by the Ministry.”
Regarding the destination of the unused batteries, Nieves announced that they are studying the possibility of giving them a second use before discarding them. “Uruguay is working on a whole regulation regarding its second use, something that is the responsibility of the Ministry of Environment”he explained.
“The Energy Directorate has had the initiative to start studying what we can do in terms of second use,” that is, “not with respect to final waste, but rather how we can use that material that still has a useful life, such as storage for chargers,” he added.
Uruguay leads sales of electric cars in Latin America
Uruguay, like Costa Rica, are the countries with the highest penetration in the sale of electric cars. The Automotive Trade Association (ACAU) At the beginning of the year, it published official data on vehicle sales and, specifically, on electric vehicles and, according to the published data, the sales managed to increase by 80.92% during 2023 compared to 2022. According to ACAU, “the electric vehicles are establishing themselves in the market with great momentum, accompanying the global trend”.
In this sense, the general manager of ACAU, Ignacio Pazhe assured Informativo Uruguay that like Costa Ricathe country achieved one of the highest penetrations in the sale of electric vehicles in the entire Latin America.
“They are small countries that managed to be proactive and efficient in terms of infrastructure. In Uruguay The most distant points in the territory are 570 km away and today there are already 285 chargers installed per UTE. In a few days the projected 300 will be completed and one charger will be available every 50 kilometers on all national routes,” Paz explained.
Source: Ambito
