Extortionate electric car charging costs to be reined in by government

The government is planning to attack excessive charges for electric car charging as current public charging can cost as much as ICE refuelling.

When Ecotricity announced it was going to charge £6 for 30 minutes of electric car charge at its charging stations up and down the UK’s motorways, we did suggest if they were shooting themselves in the foot.

After all, there are enough downsides to EV motoring away from home without paying as much per mile to recharge your EV as it would cost to fuel a diesel car. And the diesel car fuel is 75% tax, whereas the tax on electricity is a maximum of 20%.

But it seems Ecotricity’s apparent foot shooting (and others – it’s not just Ecotricity) is also, potentially, impacting on the government’s quest to see 9% of cars sold in the UK qualifying as ULEV by 2020.

So having taken a close look at what businesses are doing, the government has plans to introduce rules next year (2017) to make costs for charging cars “consistent and transparent” and make it easier to charge your car across various networks.

A spokesman for the Department for Transport told The Times:

The number of ultra-low emission vehicles on our roads are at record levels and we want to see a reliable and hassle-free public charging network so the sector can continue to grow.

We are looking at ways to make public chargepoints more convenient for motorists, such as simplifying memberships, making pricing more consistent and transparent and making chargepoints easier to operate.

Proposals to ensure the public charging infrastructure is conducive to the growth of ULEVs on UK roads will be presented in the Modern Transport Bill early in the New Year.