Lambeth EV charge scheme targets high-rise car owners

A new project to tackle electric vehicle inequality and drive greater EV adoption among people living in council estates and high-rise flats, has been launched in the London Borough of Lambeth.

The move is good news for private hire and ridehailing drivers who do not have access to off-road parking areas where they could install electric vehicle charge points.

Lambeth Council and EV charging specialist Connected Kerb have teamed up to deploy 22 onstreet EV chargers across 11 council estates, providing easy access to EV charging for residents without off-street parking. The project will act as a blueprint to be adopted at scale by other boroughs, councils and cities across Britain to deliver a fair EV transition, including for the 40% of households nationally without off-street parking.

The project is part of Lambeth council’s wider strategy to install more than 200 charge points by 2022, ensuring every household without off-street parking is within a five-minute walk of a charge point.

EV ownership is skyrocketing, with UK registrations up 117% in 2021 compared to last year. But the transition to EVs has exposed disparities between different communities across the UK. Households which have access to a driveway make up 80% of EV owners, with the remaining 20% owned by those in houses or flats with no access to offstreet parking.

Chris Pateman-Jones, CEO of Connected Kerb, said: “People often think electric vehicles are the preserve of a fortunate few with detached houses and driveways, but this couldn’t be further from the truth. With running costs much lower than petrol and diesel cars, all communities, regardless of where they live, their social background, or whether they have a driveway or not, have lots to gain. “

He continued: “Without high EV adoption, charge point operators won’t build public charging, and without reliable charging, why would anyone go electric? We have designed our business model to overcome this and with Lambeth Council, we are delivering a fairer and equitable clean transport future – here and right across the UK.”

Shirley Rodrigues, London deputy mayor for environment and energy, said: “Equal access to public charging is a key step towards a fair switch to clean transport and vital if we are to meet our ambition of being a zero carbon city by 2030.”

Each of Connected Kerb’s chargers will provide a 7kW charge, perfect for overninght onstreet charging where residents are parked for a predictable amount of time each day. Every charge point will feature contactless payment via the Connected Kerb app with a consistent network and tariff across the sites, enabling fair and equal access for everyone.

Connected Kerb’s infrastructure has a longlasting design. The charging infrastructure is located below ground with passive chargers that can be easily ‘switched on’ by adding the above ground charge point to match consumer demand.

This project was funded in part through the UK Government’s On-Street Residential Charge Point Scheme, available to all local authorities in the UK. Through the scheme, 75% of the costs were financed by the Office for Zero Emission Vehicles and the remaining costs were covered by the council.