Question
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Davies of Gower on 7 February (HL1914), what assessment they have made of recent findings by the RAC that only 39 per cent of motorway services in England have at least six rapid or ultra-rapid chargers for electric vehicles; and what assessment they have made of why their target for 100 per cent of motorway services in England to have at least six rapid or ultra-rapid chargers by the end of 2023 has not been met.
Answered on
22 February 2024
There are now 800 open-access (can be used with any electric vehicle) rapid (50kW) and ultra-rapid (150Kw+) chargepoints at motorway service areas (MSAs) in England. More than 565 of these chargepoints are ultra-rapid. This is a substantial increase of over 300 ultra-rapid chargers at MSAs in the last year and 97% of MSAs now have open-access charging.
56 of the 114 MSA (49%) sites now have at least six ultra-rapid open access chargepoints.
A major challenge is securing the electrical capacity required at sites which can be remote. A £70m pilot for the Rapid Charging Fund opened for applications, specifically targeting MSAs in England.
As well as securing power to a site, other barriers include land configuration, consents issues, and planning and wayleave blockers.
Government is working closely with the distribution network operators, MSA operators, chargepoint operators and other key stakeholders in industry on wider challenges to chargepoint rollout and overcoming barriers at those sites that still need to reach their baseline provision.