On June 26, the Mobility Committee decided to launch an urban funding program for electric mobility as part of the Integrated Climate Protection Concept (IKSK). The aim of the "Aachen drives electric" program is, on the one hand, to create publicly usable charging infrastructure on private company premises. On the other hand, Aachen-based companies that are converting their vehicle fleets to e-cars and require charging infrastructure for this purpose are to be supported.

Electromobility and climate protection
Mayor Sibylle Keupen emphasized in a press conference on 9 July that electromobility plays a major role on the city's path to climate neutrality. "The funding program for charging infrastructure that has now been launched is an important building block in our Integrated Climate Protection Concept 2.0," she said. "Mobility in our city holds great potential, especially for a development towards more environmental protection. Together with the further conversion of the city's transport infrastructure towards climate-friendly mobility, the quality of life for the people of Aachen will also increase. There will be less congestion, exhaust fumes and noise, more space and better routes for cyclists and pedestrians."

Well positioned in terms of electromobility
City Councillor Frauke Burgdorff emphasized that the city of Aachen is doing very well in terms of electromobility compared to the national average. "At the end of the first quarter of 2025, around 8,700 battery-electric and plug-in vehicles were registered in the city of Aachen." According to Burgdorff, this corresponds to a share of 7.5 percent of all registered passenger vehicles. Nationwide, the comparable share of the total number of cars is 5.5 percent.

Burgdorff attributes this positive development in Aachen in part to the fact that the city is expanding its charging infrastructure for e-vehicles "ahead of the curve" together with an ever-increasing number of operators. "This means that the city is trying to manage the development of the charging infrastructure in such a way that potential users who do not have access to a private charging facility have the security of being able to switch to sufficient publicly accessible charging facilities in public spaces," explained Burgdorff.

In the period from September 2018 to the end of 2023, the city - together with many partner companies and institutions - was able to set up 670 charging points as part of a national funding program. 380 of these are for public use. According to Burgdorff, this work has greatly accelerated the overall expansion and provides a good basis for further expansion in the future. By the end of 2024, Aachen already had well over 800 publicly usable charging points.

Burgdorff referred to the electromobility strategy. "It defines the most important fields of action and core tasks that we want to focus on until 2030 in order to remain successful in the field of electromobility in the long term," said the city councillor. This strategy was unanimously adopted by the Mobility Committee in January 2025.

The new funding program
The funding program approved by the Mobility Committee in June 2025 provides around six million euros for the development of charging infrastructure for the period 2025 to 2030 as part of the City of Aachen's integrated climate protection concept 2.0," explained Marc Heusch. Together with the electric mobility team in the Department of Mobility and Transport, he is responsible for expanding the charging infrastructure for electric vehicles in the city of Aachen. With the program, the city wants to promote the further expansion of the charging infrastructure on private but publicly accessible company premises, said Heusch. These could be customer parking spaces for retailers, for example. On the other hand, companies are to be increasingly encouraged to operate their company vehicles electrically in the future.

The specialist administration assumes that the growth in electromobility in Aachen will make it possible to save up to 11,000 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) per year from the beginning of 2031. This corresponds to approximately ten percent of all mobility measures within the framework of the IKSK.

The individual funding amounts depend on the charging infrastructure:

- Wallboxes AC up to and including 22 kilowatts (kW): €1,250 per charging point

- AC charging points up to and including 22 kW: €2,500 per charging point

- Charging stations DC 50kW to 150 kW: €20,000 per charging station

- HPC charging stations equal to and over 150 kW: €50,000 per charging station

Interested companies can find all information on the website of the City of Aachen: www.aachen.de/elektromobilitaet