A government grant of £25 million to support new cross-pavement EV charging schemes has been hailed as a major boost to the take-up of electric cars by enabling households without a driveway to charge an EV cheaply on the road.
The cash will be spent on installing covered gullies that can carry a charge cable across a pavement to an EV parked on the road. It is hoped the solution will tackle a problem faced by around nine million UK homes and in turn drive up the uptake of EVs.
However, critics are worried the solution still has significant challenges to overcome, especially around running costs and usability, before it becomes a fully viable solution.
Many councils are already using the cash to roll out pilot schemes. Oxfordshire County Council, for example, has made £700,000 available for 500 gullies and money towards home chargers.
“A third of Oxfordshire households don’t have off-street parking, so we believe this could give residents the confidence to switch to an EV,” said the council’s environment chief councillor, Judy Roberts. “Being able to access home electricity rates and park in your usual spot are the sorts of things that are likely to make EV ownership a reality for many people.”
Dorset’s Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council has approved a similar scheme, with almost 30% of households in the district lacking off-street parking.
However, councillors noted the limitations of the gullies, which will require owners to be able to secure a parking space within reach of their charge cable.
Instead, “households will have to negotiate with their neighbours over use of the parking space”, said councillor Andy Hadley.
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The headline of this article is ''Critics warn against governments £25m plan for EV charging gullies', then fails to mention a single critic in the article!
Local councillors (aka plastic politicians) arguing at local levels rather than coming up with a viable strategy to deliver home charging.
Why would the household need to pay to remove the gully if they move house? Surely these gulleys should last decades and future owners could use it. We should be building up our EV infrastructure and this is part of the process, not removing them a few years after installation. Also the £100 annual charge seems a bit steep - what costs are there after it's installed?
Great idea but no one will go for it now they're talking about charging you for licences and operating costs to have one outside your house. You're better off just getting an EV charger cable cover and a trip hazard warning sign. Fifty quid. Done.
Councils would probably increase the charge over time too. It’s hard to justify “overhead” costs for a gully in a pavement.
Trust me you would save a lot more than £100 a year with cheap rate home charging compared to using public chargers. I don't know where they got that figure from.