In order to meet the demand for medium and long-distance journeys, the federal government is issuing a call for tenders for a nationwide, demand-based and user-friendly fast-charging network with 1000 locations across Germany – the so-called Deutschlandnetz (“Germany Network”). Each of the charging points must provide a minimum of 300 kW of power. In this way, it will be possible to reach a fast-charging point anywhere in Germany in just a few minutes and recharge within a short period of time.
The construction and operation of the Deutschlandnetz will be awarded in two separate tenders:
- Regional lots
- Nationwide lots on motorways
A flexible price corridor is provided for in both tenders. By defining a price model for charging at the locations of the German network, the aim is to ensure that there are no harmful repercussions for the market developing in parallel and that users find fair prices at the same time. The range of the flexible price corridor has been chosen with both market economy and climate policy aspects in mind.
This step of moving away from providing funding and towards a tendering process is a paradigm shift in government support for the expansion of charging infrastructure in Germany. In addition to the funding programmes of the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure for public and non-public charging infrastructure, there is now an approach in which the construction and guarantee of the operation of the charging points are contractually binding for the winners of the tendering procedure. The evaluation criteria include costs, concept and user friendliness.