A new and so far unannounced offensive with the purpose of filling the Danish roads with electric vehicles may be a strong element in the Danish government’s climate efforts. This is the hope of the Ministry for Transport and Energy after a financially strong international investor group based in Israel has decided to turn Copenhagen into Europe’s capital for electric vehicles, writes Berlingske Tidende.

“At the moment the officials are studying the project. The legal matters need to be in place. However, I am very positive towards the project and I hope it will become a reality already during the period up to 2015," says Minister for Transport and Energy Jakob Axel Nielsen.

According to Berlingske Tidende the investor group – which does not yet wish to stand forward – is headed by a former top executive in one of the world’s leading software companies. Since last August the group has been in contact with the Ministry of Environment, the Ministry of Taxation as well as the Ministry of Energy.

In the long term the investors will finance 500,000 charging stations in parking lots, at places of work and private housing. They will operate the stations so that the Danish people are to pay for electricity in the same way as they pay for gas today. The vehicles should be able to run 150 km on one charging.

The government is to contribute solutions making less expensive energy accessible. The investors also wish exclusivity to the charging system for a certain period just as they require that the government will exempt the electric vehicles from taxation in order for the investors to sell them on favourable terms.