London to add 50,000 EV charge points by 2025

50,000 electric vehicle (EV) charge points will be built in London over the next six years, announced London Mayor Sadiq Khan as he launched London’s EV Infrastructure Plan this morning (June 17).

The plans signal a major expansion of London’s EV charging network as City Hall expects the number of EVs on the roads to grow from its current number of around 20,000 to 330,000 by 2025.

London currently hosts 25% of the UK’s electric vehicle charge points with 2,400 public chargers spread over 1,200 locations.

However, the Mayor says the city will need up to 5000 charge points by 2020, and up to 50,000 by 2025 to cope with the expected rising demand, which they say will be driven by a combination of new low-emission regulations such as the ULEZ, ‘supportive policy’ at all levels of government and a decrease in the cost of EVs.

Speaking at the launch of the plan at the Institution of Engineering and Technology today, the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan said: ‘London’s air is so dirty and polluted that it amounts to nothing less than a serious public health crisis.

‘I want London to lead the world in this ambition, with all new cars and vans on London roads to meeting these standards by 2030, not 2040 as the government is proposing.

‘To make this vision a reality we must make sure all Londoners have access to the essential infrastructure required to run and maintain an electric vehicle. This is a massive operation and can only be achieved if the public and private sector come together to deliver London’s electric future.’

The plan was developed in partnership with the Mayor’s Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Taskforce, which was set up last year to better understand London’s future EV needs and includes members from organisations such as Ofgem and London Councils.

Steve Gooding, director of the RAC Foundation who are part of the Taskforce said: ‘The Mayor’s plan rightly recognises that delivering a recharging network on the scale and complexity envisaged for London will involve a multitude of players, a large number of whom, including ourselves, have been pleased to be part of this taskforce.’

Responding to the plan, London Assembly member Caroline Pidgeon said there are some ‘welcome initiatives’ but more needs to be done to encourage the adoption of electric buses.

‘We cannot escape the fact that on the issue of electric buses London is lagging behind many other cities,’ she said.

‘As a proportion of London’s overall bus network the number electric buses remains a very small fraction.’

‘Sadly the Mayor has not set out any policies over how to speed up the introduction of electric buses that London so desperately needs.’

Read the full plan here.

Last month, it was announced that 1076 new residential EV charging points have been installed across London as part of the Go Ultra Low City Scheme (GULCS), a joint initiative between Transport for London (TfL), the Greater London Authority (GLA) and London Councils.

Photo credit – Pixabay.