Surging fuel costs mean charging an electric car using a public point is now estimated to be cheaper on a per-mile basis than running a car on petrol.
A comparison by Charge UK puts the average cost of a kiloWatt hour from a public EV charger at 54p which, when factored against unleaded having risen by 24p and diesel by 47p since February, makes an electric car cheaper to run.
Charge UK bases that estimate on an average EV travelling 3.59 miles for every kWh used, with a petrol car returning 9.41 miles per litre (42.8mpg).
The organisation, which represents chargepoint operators, drew its data from Zapmap and the RAC. It says that based on the average motorist covering 7,100 miles annually, EV owners charging using ‘standard’ or ‘standard plus’ public points (3kW to 49kW) can save £119 a year compared to the driver of a petrol-powered car. Anyone exclusively charging using off-peak electricity from the cheapest home-energy tariff, meanwhile, would be £1,029 better off.
Charge UK concedes, however, that if using only rapid or ultra-rapid public points (50kW+), an EV driver would be £316 worse off than the owner of a petrol car.
Vicky Read, Charge UK’s chief executive, says “the cost of public charging is now the final hurdle for mass EV adoption”, and urged the government to eliminate “the VAT penalty on public charging”, which sees the tax applied at 20% to power dispensed by public devices, compared to the 5% rate given to home electricity.
