With many forecourt firms wondering if now is the right time to invest in EV charging, figures from mapping and data firm Zapmap indicate that each chargepoint connection is used just once a day on average.
The firm says 3.9m charging sessions took place at public points in November. With a total of 123,218 connectors on the UK’s network, that equates to each plug being used 31.6 times in the month, equivalent to roughly once a day.
While there are roughly 1.3m electric cars in the UK, around 90% of owners are able to charge their cars at home where electricity is significantly cheaper and more convenient to access. Zapmap previously shared that the users of public points are mainly comprised of EV owners who lack at-home charging, with just 23% of customers having driveways.
The UK’s 123,218 public plugs are spread across 87,168 devices, Zapmap says, and infrastructure is heavily skewed towards slower chargepoints. Around 48,000 chargers deliver electricity at under 8 kiloWatts, with a further 21,215 charging at between 8kW and 50kW, and 17,829 capable of providing rapid/ultra-rapid sessions at speeds above 50kW.
This year has seen 13,469 new chargepoints installed in the UK, with 6,220 of these being slow ≤8kW devices. The government has previously said it is focussing on improving near-home public charging for drivers who lack off-street parking facilities. Devices that facilitate these kinds of sessions tend to be slower ones, with local authorities frequently partnering with roadside chargepoint firms to install new points in multi-million-pound projects.
