Barcelona invests itself in the future of the electric car

Barcelona (CNA).- Barcelona wants to be more involved in the development of the electric car. For this reason, the city will install 212 more charging stations within the next year, bringing the total number from 38 to 250 stations. This action is part of the ‘Live Barcelona’ platform, an initiative that was signed by the Barcelona City Hall, the Catalan Government, SEAT, and Endesa. With the slogan ‘Plug in Barcelona’, the objective of the initiative is to promote the use of electric cars in the Catalan capital. In order to achieve this, they have installed a citizen’s information point and started a website to resolve doubts about the electric car and promote sustainable transport.
The ‘Live Barcelona’ project intends to promote the implementation of the electric car through 5 different axes, giving support to the industry, sustainable transport and the environment. These axes are: providing support to projects concerning sustainable mobility, creating technology and knowledge networks, promoting organisations and events that benefit the industry, installing electric charging stations and becoming a reference within the sector.

The organisations behind ‘Live Barcelona’ are Barcelona’s City Hall, the Catalan Government and the businesses SEAT and Endesa. The Catalan Minister for Economy, Antoni Castells, spoke of this public-private collaboration, saying that Catalonia has to act as a “precursor” for the electric car on a “world” level.

In addition, Castells assured that “green business” is a sector that could help the country come out of the economic crisis and that in this moment they are very well positioned to be “references”. He also commented on the “leadership” role that Barcelona must take in this growing industry, showing the capacities of Catalan industry at an international level. In this sense, the mayor of Barcelona, Jordi Hereu, affirmed that the city must become a “grand laboratory” of automotives. For this reason, the mayor has called out to the automotive industry, asking that they use Barcelona as a base for “innovation and risk taking”.

A new website

The ‘Live Barcelona’ initiative has created a website that brings together all of the information about electric mobility in the Barcelona metropolitan area. This website aims to provide all of the contents and necessary services for potential users of the electric car.

Catalan information point

Starting today, electric car users in Barcelona can get a card that allows users to recharge their vehicles for free at the various charging stations in the city. The card can be obtained in the new citizen’s information point, ‘El Punt Live’, where an expert will be there to attend to any doubts that electric car users may have. The office is situated in Plaça Pi i Sunyer 8-10.