Environmental Leader

Germany aims to put a million electric vehicles on its roadways by 2020, and the country is putting $705 million behind the effort to boost adoption of the technology.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition government agreed to spend the $705 million by 2011 to accellerate development of the technology, reports Bloomberg.

Germany wants to establish “an efficient infrastructure” for electric cars and it plans to have in excess of 5 million electric vehicles on the road by 2030, which would account for almost 10 percent of all vehicles. The nation currently has 53.6 million cars in service, according to Wikipedia.

The effort coincides with the government’s goal to cut greenhouse-gas emissions 40 percent by 2020 and also boost the percentage of electricity from renewable sources to 30 percent from 12 percent.

Several of the major German automakers already are developing electric cars.

BMW’s “Project i” series of electric cars will exist under a different sub-brand, helping the automaker distinguish its more energy efficient offerings much in the same way it differentiates its premium fast cars under the “M” label. The MegaCity is expected to be BMW’s first offering under Project i.

Volkswagen hopes to put its first electric vehicles on the market in 2013. It wants to offer a large number of all-electric vehicles at affordable prices, and is aiming for 1.0-1.5 percent of the global all-electric vehicle market by 2020.