Over Half of Councils Spent Nothing on EV Chargers

Over half of councils in the UK have spent nothing on electric vehicle chargers in 2021.

The majority (52%) of the 374 councils haven’t invested in charging points, despite record electric vehicle sales and a commitment from the UK government to ban sales of new petrol and diesel vehicles from 2030.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) submission, from DevicePilot, found 46% of councils said they had no idea how many charge points they intended to install next year, or are simply planning to install none at all.

Pilgrim Beart, DevicePilot CEO and co-founder, said on fleetworld.co.uk; “Universal EV ownership is not a target, it’s an inevitability. In the next 10 years, more than half the cars on the road will be electric.

“To facilitate this transformation, the UK must install tens of thousands of charge points reaching every corner of the country.”

 The FOI also indicated 60% of councils had received complaints about the availability, reliability or number of charging points.

There are currently about 25,000 public charging devices in the UK. But more than that will need to be installed every single year for 14 years to hit a target of 480,000 devices estimated to be needed by 2035 to facilitate demand and the number of electric vehicles on the road.

This is on top of the 19 million home charge points needed, according to Ofgem the energy regulator.

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