They are best known for bike-riding, but the climate-vulnerable Dutch are leading the way for electric cars with the largest number of charging stations in Europe.
Teslas and other vehicles can be seen plugged in on practically every street corner thanks to a network of some 75,000 stations — nearly a third of the entire EU total.
Investing to put enough charging stations in the reach of drivers is crucial for countries that have set targets for an all-electric car future.
For Nienke Bergsma, the lightbulb moment when she decided to buy an electric car came when four charging posts were installed at the bottom of her Rotterdam road.
Bergsma, a 37-year-old mature student living in the centre of the port city, said she had wanted to “contribute to the protection of the environment”.
While it was a headache at first to get used to the rhythm of charging, she said she was now “very happy” to have taken the leap.
Around one in every five of the 400,000 new cars sold annually in the Netherlands is now electric, due partly to tax breaks and other incentives during the last decade.
But the…
