Thailand continues to fuel the growth of its electric vehicle supply chain, with the latest investment incentives focusing on the repair and refurbishment of used EV batteries, says the Board of Investment (BoI).
The expansion of EV manufacturing, one of 12 S-curve industries the country is targeting, has led the BoI to introduce a new investment promotion category covering service centres for the repair, repacking and reuse of used EV batteries.
Investment in energy storage systems, which are often used with clean energy, also falls under this category.
"This move will further complement the BoI's comprehensive EV supply chain policy and incentives," said the board, following its recent meeting chaired by the BoI chairman and Finance Minister Pichai Chunhavajira.
The new investment promotion will proceed alongside the state's existing EV incentives, with the goal of bolstering Thailand's efforts to become a regional hub for EV production.
The government set a goal for battery EVs to comprise 30% of total car manufacturing by 2030 through the production of 725,000 zero-emission cars, 675,000 electric motorcycles and 34,000 electric buses and trucks.
The swift rise in the number of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) in the country underscores the need for improved management of used batteries.
From January to April this year, the number of newly registered BEVs rose by 36.3% year-on-year to 35,755 units while new HEV registrations surged by 58.4% year-on-year to 48,528 units, according to the Federation of Thai Industries, citing statistics from the Department of Land Transport.
During the same meeting, the BoI resolved to approve investment promotion applications for eight projects worth a combined 56.9 billion baht.
Among them are two data centre investment proposals: a 7.1-billion-baht project to build a data centre in Samut Prakan by a multinational firm headquartered in the US, and a 3.3-billion-baht project to expand a data centre operated by True Internet Data Center in the same province.
Thailand is intensifying its focus on data centre investments, which are extensive networks of computer servers utilised for the remote storage and management of data.