The rate of adoption of electric vehicles continued to increase in 2022, such that, as reported by The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, by the end of 2022, the registration of new electric cars overtook new car registrations of diesel cars for the first time. In January 2023, electric and hybrid vehicles accounted for 34.4% of new car registrations. It seems a certainty that the number of electric vehicles on UK roads will continue to grow at an increasing rate.
There will soon come a point at which the land grab that has been ongoing for a number of years by the UK charge point operators is not about ensuring the operator is best placed to capitalise on future demand, but rather revenues from current demand are sufficient to drive profitability. Indeed, according to Zap Map, there was a 31% increase in the number of publicly available charge points in the UK in the period from January 2022 to January 2023.
One outcome of the approaching point at which charge point operators realise significant profitability is that there has been increased interest from new entrants to the market such as infrastructure funds for investing in or acquiring charge point operators. Recent examples of this activity include EQT Infrastructure’s acquisition of Instavolt (on which Fladgate advised the CIIF and Zouk as sellers) and Aviva’s investment in Connected Kerb.
Whilst the exponential increase in the number of publicly available charge points will be welcome news to electric vehicle drivers, the rate at which such charge points are being deployed in residential areas where there is no access to off-street parking continues to lag behind projected requirements. Those people who do not have access to off-street parking will continue to have reservations regarding the adoption of electric vehicles for want of reliable access to reasonably priced charging.
For those members of the public that do not have private off-street parking (particularly relevant to people living in town and city centres) the lack of access to charging infrastructure is more than a factor against the adoption of electric vehicles; it is an absolute barrier. In certain areas of the UK, the lack of access to publicly available charge points in residential areas is particularly noteworthy. Wales, Northern Ireland and the North East of England have particularly low numbers of such charge points and face the risk of being thrust into a new kind of fuel poverty.
The Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Strategy published by the UK Government in March 2022 noted that the pace of roll-out of charging infrastructure was too slow, that there were regional disparities in deployment and that local on-street charging ought to be a priority area of focus. The strategy put forward a number of commitments as to how these issues would be addressed. It remains to be seen in 2023 whether these commitments and the measures implemented to give effect to these commitments start to resolve some of these charging infrastructure issues.
