TotalEnergies (formerly Total) has just inaugurated a 100% electric service station in La Défense, near Paris, while 10% of the French car fleet is now made up of this type of vehicle.
The finding is clear: the station is already widely popular with VTC drivers.
REPORTAGE
The owners of thermal vehicles who used to go through the service station of Courbevoie, in the district of La Défense near Paris, know this only too well.
Just a month ago, the place was converted to 100% electric.
Consequence: the petrol pumps have been replaced by six charging points for electric cars and a shop is open 24 hours a day. TotalEnergies (new name of Total) has just inaugurated this novelty, while 10% of the French car fleet is now electric.
And this is a first in France.
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"The first in a long series"
For the moment, this service station looks more like a symbol of the change at work at Total. But the concept will be brought to multiply. "This is the first in a long series since there will be a hundred before the end of 2023", indicates Pierre-Emmanuel Bredin, director of the France network of TotalEnergies, at the microphone of Europe 1. "It is an old gas station whose thermal distribution has been completely replaced by high-power electric load. People need charging stations if they want to have an electric car. "
The place is already very popular with VTC drivers, whose fleets are increasingly "green".
Uber's goal, for example, is to achieve 50% clean vehicles by 2025. But the lack of infrastructure to charge cars is currently a problem for platforms.
"In terms of the brakes on the mass adoption of electric vehicles, beyond the cost of acquiring the vehicle, you have the anxiety of recharging and the anxiety of saying to yourself 'I don't have enough batteries left to go. accept the next race '", confirms on Europe 1 Jonathan Lévy, development director for southern and western Europe at Uber.
Reassured VTC drivers
This type of station will therefore relieve the drivers already converted to electric, such as Franck. "It reassures me a lot. We don't know which races we will fall on. If it happens, it will be quite a few kilometers, so it's really super reassuring, reliable," he testifies. Another oil company, Shell, has also opened its 100% electric station in Paris. But it is only accessible to professionals.