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Ultra-cheap energy, Chinese cars drive EV revolution in Nepal

A dam-building spree has led to low energy prices and widespread electric vehicle adoption in a country otherwise dependent on fossil fuel imports

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Visitors at an electric vehicle motor show in Kathmandu. Photo: AFP

Taxi driver Surendra Parajuli’s decision to buy an electric cab would have been unthinkable a decade ago, when chronic power cuts left Nepalis unable to light their homes at night.

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But a dam-building spree has led to dirt-cheap energy prices in a landlocked Himalayan republic otherwise entirely dependent on fossil fuel imports, meaning the switch has put more money in his pocket.

“It has meant huge savings for me,” Parajuli, the proud new owner of a battery-powered and Chinese-made BYD Atto 3, said in the capital Kathmandu.

“It gives 300km in a single charge and costs me a tenth of what petrol does. And it’s environmentally friendly.”

Kathmandu is ground zero of an incipient transport revolution set to see the clapped out cars that clog its traffic-snarled streets make way for emissions-free alternatives.

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More than 40,000 electric vehicles are on the roads around the mountainous country, according to official estimates – a small fraction of the 6.2 million motor vehicles currently in service.

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