City of York Council is to introduce a new EV charging strategy to help accelerate EV take up across the city.
A report detailing the proposal will be taken to a public executive meeting for approval.
If approved, the council will introduce Fast EV chargepoints to at least a minimum of 5% of all its long-stay parking bays in council-owned car parks by 2023.
This will reportedly cost circa £800,000 and will be subject to external funding bids and reviewed as part of the development of York’s Local Transport Plan later this year.
In addition to the enhanced fast charger network the council said it is also developing two Hyper Hub sites that will provide rapid and ultra-rapid facilities.
Subject to securing further external funding, a third site is also being developed.
Since 2013, the council has provided a public charging network for EVs, which consists of 20 fast double-headed charge points (40 sockets) and five rapid chargers across the city.
In 2014 there were 1,510 charging sessions, by 2018 that had increased to 13,695.
Cllr Paula Widdowson, executive member for climate change at City of York Council, said: “This strategy will provide a future proofed network with high quality facilities to support this increased demand.
“Not only will it support the adoption of electric vehicles with associated air quality and climate change benefits, it will meet the needs of the next generation of plug-in vehicles.”
The council said a part of the proposals will be to ensure it offers an equal opportunity for all users – with on street and off street parking – and to ensure that tariffs are set at a fair rate.
As the the current tariff of 15p/kWh hasn’t been revised since it was set in 2013, the council will review the tariff price point.
The council said its proposed tariff approach will take into account increases in electricity and running costs to ensure that the network is financially sustainable.
During 2020/2021 it is proposed to increase the tariff to 20p/kWh for fast chargers and 25p/kWh for rapid and ultra-rapid chargers.
All new rapid and ultra-rapid units will allow bank card payments for the same 25p/kWh fee.
Regular users will have the option of signing up to a subscription network where they will pay a monthly fee in return for lower usage tariffs.
Tariffs will be reviewed every year and electricity supplying the chargepoints will be part of the council’s energy contract, which purchases renewable energy.
The council said that new conditions will also be introduced to ensure that users of EV bays are using them principally to charge their vehicles.
Enforcement action could be taken where a vehicle is using a bay and is not plugged into the charging point. Time limits could also be imposed.
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