The NAMA Support Project “Promotion of Electric Mobility in Cabo Verde”, which is locally known by its Portuguese acronym ProMEC, was formally launched in a virtual meeting last month. During the launch, which was attended by approx. 60 stakeholders from the public and private sectors, the Minister of Industry, Commerce and Industry, Alexandre Monteiro stressed that the project will greatly contribute to the implementation of Cabo Verde’s Electric Mobility Policy and Action Plan adopted in February 2019. He stated that the government is promoting electric vehicles to decarbonise the road transport sector “that absorbs approx. 30% of the total domestic consumptions of imported fossil fuels”. These fuels can be substituted with electricity that is locally generated with renewable energy and set to contribute 54% to the country’s electricity mix by 2030, as explained by Rito Évora, the National Director of Industry, Commerce and Energy (in 2019 the share was 18.4%). The government of Cabo Verde therefore set itself the objective to convert the fleet of the public administration to electric vehicles by 2030 and phase out conventional vehicles by 2050, which is a first on the African continent. 

Lucius Mayer-Tasch from GIZ (which is implementing the project jointly with the Ministry of Industry Commerce and Energy), explained that the formal launch came nine months after the start of ProMEC in June 2020. He introduced the main project activities which include, among others, a rebate programme for EVs and EV charging stations, support for the establishment of a basic public charging infrastructure and electric bus demonstration projects. 

During the launch of ProMEC Mr. Monteiro and Mr. Evora also stressed that there are strong synergies between electric mobility and the energy transition and revealed that the government intends to promote smart charging as well as the use EV of batteries for supporting the grid integration of higher shares of renewable energy using vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology in the future. These aspects will also be addressed by ProMEC.

More information incl. a recording of the speeches and presentations made during the launch is available on MICE’s Facebook page, on the site of the news agency Inforpress, as well as in the coverage of the launch by the TV stations TCV and Record TV.