99.4% of cars currently work in Navarra with petrol or diesel. As of December 31, 2022, the General Directorate of Transport registered a total of 352,997 passenger vehicles in the municipality of Foral, of which 1,300 were electric vehicles—only 0.37% of the total.
In this scenario, there are service stations in complete transition towards an environmentally friendly energy model, in which administration and manufacturers have chosen electricity. This is what the data shows: its use fails according to the set goals. Manufacturers assume that the share of purely electric vehicles will not yet reach 5% in 2025; On the other hand, five years later, they claim that it represents 15% of the total.
The general director of the Spanish Association of Gas Station Employers (CES), Nacho Rabadán, believes that “it is impossible to reach these figures, and this causes frustration among citizens.” Although sales of pure electric vehicles in Spain between 2021 and 2023 have not met registration expectations and are “60% below,” according to this expert, the National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan (PNIEC) has updated its 2030 goals upward: from 5 to 5.45 million electric vehicles on the roads. Rabadán took part this Tuesday in a conference organized by the Navarra Service Station Business Association, where its president, Jon Villares, also spoke.
“The future will be multi-energy, and electricity, gasoline, and LPG will coexist.”
The Director General of CES gave a presentation entitled The Role of Gas Stations in the Mobility of the Future. In it, he emphasized that “Most of the time it is inconvenient to deliver something fueled by gasoline or diesel.” He justified this statement in his definition of these companies: “Gas stations sell energy for mobility. We now offer petrol and diesel because they are the most demanded by customers. “If they wanted another energy source, we would still offer it.”
Employment and cities
The Foral Community has 262 stations, mainly family SMEs, that create almost 900 jobs and play a key role in preventing migration in cities and rural areas. They all have to face this transition in which the administration and the manufacturers defend the electric drive. Rabadán emphasizes that the user of this type of vehicle “is a phenomenal customer. Due to his high purchasing power, since he spent an average of 42,000 euros on the car, he is theoretically concerned about the environment, and during the half-hour stay in the facilities, he can be offered other services that bring economic benefits to the company. However, it is worth noting that at the moment, Gas stations lack “that consumer profile.”
Rabadán recalls that the government and some brands blame the gas stations themselves for this scenario because they do not invest in charging stations. However, the Director General of CES relies on data from the Association for the Development of Electric Mobility (AEDIVE) to explain the reason for the non-placement: “This association states that publicly accessible charging stations are only used 4% of the operating time, and that percentage is impossible for a private company to be profitable.”
Although the stations are not afraid to examine viable alternatives for the placement of charging points, “The event was attended by providers who, together with industry partners, demonstrated more attractive solutions.” We want you to explore these possibilities. However, current regulations already require this year that gas stations that have charging points have charging points. In 2019, they sold five million liters of fuel.
As of August 23, a total of 1,100 gas stations in Spain had to comply with this directive. Of these, around 25 or 30 are in Navarre, and if they have not done so, they will be sanctioned. The most economical investment for installing a charging point at a station is about 50,000 euros, but “this money is wasted because there is currently no profitability since there is no demand.”
Maze with multiple exits
Rabadán not only defends electricity as a sustainable option but “any alternative that contributes to it.” Decarbonize mobility, such as bioethanol, which reduces CO2 emissions per liter by 72% compared to a liter of gasoline of fossil origin, LPG (liquefied petroleum gas)“. But the Director General of CES affirms that in Spain “the more renewable the gasoline, the more taxes it pays because the administration is disguised with a single technology”, namely electricity. For this reason, he insists that “The future will be multi-energetic and electric; liquefied petroleum gas (butane) or synthetic fuels, among others, will coexist.”
Rabadán predicts that citizens “will be dependent on gasoline and diesel for a long time to come,” which is why he “promotes biofuels and supports innovative projects on synthetic fuels from refineries.”
The rest of the agenda
Other guests spent the rest of the day on other topics such as Formulas to reduce consumption in the washing area; How to manage and improve image to increase gas station business revenue; collective bargaining, training, and prevention of occupational hazards in these establishments; how to behave towards a company that causes losses; and how to optimize purchases at the free gas stations.
Mission and vision. The General Director of CES explains: “The mission is to defend and represent the employees against other agents in the industry, and the vision is to drive a necessary energy transition so that the stations continue to be the ones that provide energy for the mobility of companies and individuals.”
Retirement parks in Spain average 14 years per car. He defends a renewal plan without discrimination against technology since “a current petrol or diesel vehicle has nothing to do with the one of 20 years ago”. In this way, the parking lot would be renovated, he says.
Correct the mobility model. The Director General of CES emphasizes that the current mobility model does not take into account the specificities of the rural world. “For example, I live in a town in Segovia with 600 inhabitants in the mountains, and in winter at 15 degrees below zero, the electric battery can’t start. There are many cities like mine in Spain. And I’m an electric user,” he repeats.
