Carrefour gears up to 3.000 EV chargers in France

Carrefour will install 3 000 charging points for electric vehicles in the car parks of its 400-plus Carrefour Market supermarkets by 2025. On Wednesday, the French multinational retail corporation announced that the franchise supermarkets should also be equipped.

According to the press release, Carrefour will thus become France’s leading electric charging network, with more than 700 stations and 5 000 spaces, half of which will deliver high power provided by Enedis. Each hypermarket will get an average of ten electric charging spaces, while each supermarket will get five.

Fast charging

Carrefour had already announced the installation of 2 000 charging points in its hypermarkets. Now, the company is betting on fast charging. Each supermarket and hypermarket will offer a majority of charging stations (60%) ranging from 50 to 300 kW, which allows for a quick recharge in 20 to 60 minutes. The rates have yet to be specified.

Two to four charging points in each car park will be of medium power (22 kW), allowing batteries to be recharged while shopping, with the first hour free for customers with the group’s loyalty card.

Customers driving BEVs plug-in hybrids represent 3 and 4% of shop traffic. Still, many customers are already asking cashiers for charging stations, says Arnaud d’Hoop, director of innovation at Carrefour’s property subsidiary. As a result, Carrefour will also offer free recharging for electric bikes and scooters.

European pressure and French support

With the plan, Carrefour is joining a host of retailers in France like Leclerc (5 000 charging stations by the end of 2022), Lidl, and Système U, other large retail groups, and major fuel retailers for the most part. In addition, Tesla will also install charging stations in the car parks of some Casino supermarkets and hypermarkets.

While the European Commission proposes to ban the sale of combustion engine vehicles from 2035, the French Mobility Orientation Act (LOM) requires one in twenty parking spaces in existing buildings to be pre-connected and 20% of spaces in new car parks to be pre-equipped. The Advenir public subsidy covers up to 60% of its supply and installation costs, excluding tax.

Carrefour relied on the Dutch operator Allego for its hypermarkets and on the French company Driveco for the Carrefour Markets. Drive, which already equips retailers or mobility service providers such as Leroy Merlin, Leclerc, and Sixt, inaugurated a format with Carrefour. It finances the installation of the terminal and manages its operation.