Workers install a battery for a new electric vehicle model at Mitsubishi Motor Corp's factory in Kurashiki
Workers install a battery for a new electric vehicle model at Mitsubishi Motor Corp's factory in Kurashiki, Japan May 19, 2022. Picture taken May 19, 2022. Reuters / STAFF

Green energy is set to move beyond homes and offices in Southeast Asia to power the way people move on. Leading nations in the region are swearing by their newly professed obsession with selling electric cars as their prices are set to come down rapidly.

Indonesia wants Electric Vehicles (EVs) to make up 20 percent of all automobiles produced in the country by 2025. The largest Muslim-majority nation is offering tax sops to encourage new investments. The country is also tapping its rich mineral reserves to promote EV battery production.

A few months after Seoul-based Hyundai Motor began full-scale production in Indonesia, SAIC-GM-Wuling Automobile, which leads China's growing EV market, came out with a new mini-EV that will hit the road by the year-end.

Wuling is yet to announce the prices for new EVs, though the market in Indonesia is progressing, which sold around 700 new EVs last year at a starting price of over $35,000.

Indonesia, the world's largest producer of nickel, a vital component in lithium batteries, aims to become an EV production and export hub.

Hyundai is setting up a battery plant in West Java with LG Energy Solution, for the development of charging stations and recycling of used batteries.

Thailand, which is aspiring to be a Southeast Asian connectivity hub, wants EVs to make up 30 percent of its automobile production by 2030.

On 9 June, the country cut taxes on EVs by 2 percent from 8 percent to boost local production besides the subsidy of up to 150,000 baht ($4,240) per EV doled out by the government, forcing EV makers like China's Great Wall Motor to slash the starting price of its Ora Good Cat by around 8 percent to 763,000 baht.

Great Wall, which started the sale of Ora vehicles in Thailand in November, looks to reduce prices further by starting local production in Thailand by next year.

Japan's leading automakers Toyota Motor and SAIC Motor are taking advantage of the tax sops. Toyota is expected to start selling EVs in Thailand later this year, with plans to start local production by 2024.

Mercedes-Benz, the German multinational automotive corporation, plans to start assembling vehicles from this year onwards in Thailand, Southeast Asia's second-largest economy with a population of 70 million, which expects 30 percent of the output to be electric by this decade-end.

Already some 900 public quick chargers have been erected in the country at gas stations, shopping malls, condominiums, golf courses, and hospitals.
It plans to have 4,400 public quick chargers by 2025, 12,000 by 2030, and 36,500 by 2035.

VinFast, a subsidiary of Vietnamese conglomerate Vingroup, which was set up in 2017 with a $5 billion investment, started selling locally made EVs in December.

VinFast has plans to enter the U.S. and European markets. The company introduced its first two EV models at the LA Auto Show in November to capture the US market with a competitive price tag.

The company plans to open production facilities in the U.S. by 2024 and Germany by 2025. In Vietnam, the firm is building a $174 million battery plant to produce 100,000 battery packs.

Singapore Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat has announced a sweeping set of policies, including a hike in petrol duties, rebates on new EVs, and a plan to expand the number of charging stations to 28,000 by 2030 from 1,600 at present.

Last year, Singapore started the region's first dedicated facility with a capacity to recycle 14 tons of lithium-ion batteries.

In March, Volvo announced that the Swedish automobile maker started assembling vehicles in Malaysia. China's Changan Automobile has joined hands with Fieldman Group, a Malaysian producer of palm oil, to build a joint EV assembly plant in Malaysia.

In the Philippines, a law to bolster EV production came into being in May which demands logistics providers and public transportation operators to electrify at least 5 percent of their fleets.

According to the Electric Vehicle Association of the Philippines, increasing tax perks and decreasing EV prices are building enthusiasm centered around EVs in the country.

In Asia's largest market a green energy revolution is taking place. With affordable cost, all are invited by Southeast Asian governments.