Category: Electric Vehicles

There can be no denying that electric vehicles are on the rise. Over the last five years, the total volume of plug-in vehicles registered to the UK (meaning pure electric and hybrid models), has increased fivefold to 515,000.

With growth in the number of vehicles on the roads comes a growth in demand for the infrastructure and technology to charge those vehicles, and it’s this exact topic that we’ll be diving into today as we examine the challenges and considerations associated with EV charging depots.

This article is intended to help fleet operators make smart decisions around EV charging, but it’s also packed with information that could help you get to grips with the basics of EV charging if you’re a consumer and thinking about having an electric charging point installed at your home.

What is an EV charger?

At an electric vehicle (EV) charging station or depot, you’ll find a simple charging unit that you can plug your electric vehicle into. Once plugged in, a direct electric current will flow into your vehicle, charging the battery so you can get back onto the roads.

On the 4^th January 2021, there were 20,755 public electric vehicle charging units available in the UK- with 3,880 of those being rapid-charge devices. This number is growing quickly, with the total amount of devices increasing by a quarter at one stage in 2020 and, if the current trend continues, we should expect to see it increase to around 25,000 by 2022.

Aside from public charging stations, though, there’s also the option of having a charging point installed at a residential household or commercial depot. This is desirable both for consumers with hybrid or electric cars as their main modes of transport, and for businesses who wish to electrify their fleets and have them charge up on commercial premises while not in use. With that in mind, let’s take a closer look at the type of EV chargers you’ll find in market.

Types of EV charger

Whether chargers are being bought by a commercial entity or an individual for residential use, they broadly fit into three main categories:

1) Rapid EV chargers

Naturally, these devices are the fastest type of EV chargers you’ll find in the UK. Examples include Rapid DC chargers, Tesla’s Supercharger network, and Rapid AC chargers – and they’re typically found at dedicated charging stations.

These high-speed chargers can supply power at upward of 50kWs, which means they could charge most electric vehicles to 80% power within 20 minutes to an hour, which of course varies based on the vehicle and battery.

It’s worth noting that not all vehicles capable of handling the voltage associated with rapid charging are compatible with all charging networks. Tesla’s supercharging network, for example, exclusively works with Tesla vehicles such as the Model X and Model S. Potentially the most compatible rapid charging format is CHAdeMO, with the Nissan Leaf, Hyundai EVs, and Mitsubishi hybrid models using this 50kW charging model.

2) Fast EV chargers

You’ll find fast EV chargers at locations where vehicles are likely to be parked for an hour or more. Think supermarkets, shopping centres, and the likes.

These charging devices typically offer either 7kW/h or 22kW charging speeds. By simply dividing the total kW capacity of your EV’s battery by the charging speed, you can calculate roughly how long it would take to charge your EV. So, a 50kW battery on a 22kW fast charger would require around 2-3 hours to fully charge.

3) Slow EV chargers

At the cheaper end of the EV charger price range is slow EV chargers. This is the most popular method of charging EVs residentially, with charging speeds for home units typically hovering between 2.3kW and 6kW.

Given the low voltage of these chargers, they’re often used to charge electric vehicles overnight – which is perfect when the vehicles are being used to commute to work, for example.

It wouldn’t be ideal to have cars parked for upward of 6-hour periods to charge in public spaces, so slow EV chargers are rarely found at public charging stations or even public car parks – however they’re typically a great option for consumers given the typical unit cost for one of these chargers is typically around £500 per unit.

Balancing EV charger costs

Having mapped out what type of EV chargers are available in market, the next obvious question is which type of charger is cost-effective for you to acquire?

The first step is determining the total power demands of your fleet, as well as the time you can allocate to EV charging. When considering power demands, identify:

• The total battery capacity of your individual fleet vehicles, as well as the total amount of vehicles you’d need to be charging at any one time. If you don’t put the right charging infrastructure in place, you could find yourself unable to charge one or more of your vehicles – which could impact profitability if you’re running a commercial fleet.
• The type of charging connectors your vehicles utilise, and how this compares to the charging points you’re looking to install, as well as those your vehicles will pass by and utilise when driving.

Type 2 EV chargers are compatible with the vast majority of plug-in EVs and are probably a good option for residential charging needs. Larger vehicles with higher battery capacities, however, could be better suited to CCS chargers that are capable of charging at speeds of up to 350kW/H.

Long-term cost considerations

Once you’ve established your power demands and confirmed compatibility, next consider the long-term vs short-term financial benefits associated with the infrastructure purchasing options you’re considering.

Buying just enough equipment to meet your charging needs now is a cost-effective strategy if your demand for power is unlikely to expand in the foreseeable future, however businesses that are looking to scale-up their operations in the coming years may want to consider going for slightly faster charging technology in the interim that will avoid a situation whereby you don’t have enough charging units or capacity to keep all of your vehicles operational as the fleet grows.

For a fuller break down of all of the costs that come with owning an EV fleet, read our insights.

EV charging costs: is there any help available?

One final tip from the team at Fuel Card Services is to explore whether there are any government grants available for businesses that are engaging with EV charging initiatives and who are committed to making their fleet operation more sustainable.

For residential vehicles, the government has implemented an Electric Vehicle Homecharge Scheme under which the government will subsidise a large percentage (around 75%) of the charging point installation cost – which is a great option for those commuting to work.

For commercial fleets, there are financial incentives created around reducing emissions through electrification, and the government have outlined a full list of vehicles that could be eligible for a grant that covers a percentage of the purchase cost of these vehicles. This could be a huge boost to UK businesses who are looking to reduce their carbon footprints in the coming years.

How could Fuel Card Services help?

Aside from putting the right charging infrastructure in place for your fleet, you could also look to reduce costs on fleet servicing and maintenance. Our range of professional fleet services can help you achieve exactly this, and our product offering includes everything from advanced telematics to a mileage expenses system.

Of course, it would also be great if you could save money when you charge your vehicle, and with the Shell Electric Vehicle Fuel Card, you can do just that! You’ll save up to 2p per kWh with access to over 7,000 charging points.

Get in touch today, and we’ll see how we could help your fleet.

There’s a vision shared by tech industry leaders, environmentalists, and governments around the world to replace our current vehicles and infrastructure with more sustainable electric equivalents.

Closer to home, the UK government is in fact committed to a net-zero carbon emissions transition by 2050. So, electric vehicles are inevitable – but what’s the most effective way of powering them, and could electric roads be viable source of power?

Electric vehicle challenges

The core challenge with powering electric vehicles that we’re already experiencing, and may face for years to come, is battery life. Most electric vehicle batteries on roads today are rechargeable lithium-ion batteries.

These are effective at storing electricity, but the sheer amount of power needed to keep an electric vehicle going for hours is enormous. If we build larger lithium-ion batteries, then we’ll face longer battery charging times, and deplete our natural resource of lithium.

Green Tech Media investigated whether our current reserves of lithium can be scaled to meet the increasing demand for batteries driven by companies like Tesla, who want to introduce ‘Gigafactories’ capable of producing millions of battery units at speed. Their conclusion was ‘not just no, but hell no’.

So, we’ll need a breakthrough in electric battery technology, or an alternative source of energy to guarantee the future of electric car production – which is likely to become more pressing as more legislation is introduced to promote the use of sustainable energy sources. One of those alternative energy sources could be electric roads.

Electric roads explained

The basic premise for electric roads is incredibly simple; the road infrastructure is responsible for supplying electricity to all vehicles using the road at any one time. Typically, this is achieved via either overhead or underground power lines, which transfer power directly to vehicles via inductive coils, or conductive rails.

Within most electric road systems actively used in the world today, overhead powerlines are limited to commercial use, while ground based power systems are estimated to be the most cost-effective by experts.

You can find electric roads in:

• South Korea – where electric roads were introduced as early as 2013 to provide a wireless power source designed to recharge OLEV buses (electric buses, essentially).
• Sweden – whereby a ‘dynamic charging’ system was introduced in 2019 that utilises an electrified rail system embedded within 2km of road to charge electric vehicles.

Sweden have outlined a plan and drafted a map to enable national expansion of the electric road system, which is suspected to require electrifying around 20,000km of road in order to meet a target of reducing domestic carbon emissions by 70% (by 2030).

So, electric roads are in fact a reality in the world today. They’re also being considered in the UK.

The UK’s stance on electric roads

The UK government funded a study to gauge how cost effective it would be to implement an overhead electric cable system that powers road-using freight vehicles. They estimated the total cost of this ‘E-highways’ system would amount to £19.3bn, but that it could also pay for itself within 15 years, while drastically cutting carbon emissions.

For the commercial fleet industry, such a system could have huge repercussions. Fleets that adopt electric technology quickly and mitigate their carbon impacts could avoid the costs brought about by future legislation, such as a potential carbon emissions tax. There are also projects in the works to examine the potential impact of electric roads on consumer vehicles.

Highways England begun considering and testing electric road technology in 2015, in a project that was later cancelled in 2016 due to budget limitations. However, the infrastructure that was examined is very similar to the South Korean technology introduced back in 2013 and could make a resurgence. In Highways England’s system, electric cables buried beneath these roads generate an electromagnetic field, which is absorbed by a coil placed within each electric vehicle to wirelessly transfer power.

EV safety matters, so it’s fortunate that this technology is also proving to be completely safe to pedestrians and road users alike. The total voltage output of this system at surface level is around 1 volt, meaning you wouldn’t feel the electric current even when walking barefoot.

Are electric roads cost effective?

There seems to be a very strong consensus amongst studies that electric road systems would be significantly cheaper to introduce than a national network of charging stations and larger batteries for EVs.

The former could even cost around half the amount, according to findings from the Swedish ERS study we touched on earlier. Obviously, electric vehicles will still need to be equipped with batteries even when using an electric road system. However, the total battery capacity could be reduced by around 80% when compared to a system that solely utilises charging stations.

That’s a huge saving, which could prove to be a sustainable option that mitigates the lithium resource challenges we’re facing, while also proving safe and effective for road users and pedestrians alike. For more insights on this topic, read our article on how the cost of electric cars compares to petrol equivalents.

What does this mean for commercial fleets?

As a commercial fleet operator, you may want to keep your eyes on the latest developments in electrification. Realistically, it’s likely to be a good few years from now (2021) before we see this technology implemented at scale throughout the UK, however businesses that capitalise on the advantages the technology could bring and modernise their operations accordingly could gain an edge over the competition.

In the meantime, fleet operators should take every step possible to become more efficient and save money on fuel costs. That’s where the team at Fuel Card Services can help. We supply fuel cards from a range of market leading brands, across networks covering the whole of the UK. Check out our fuel card offering to see whether your drivers could be paying less each time they stop for diesel or petrol.

The convenience of a fuel card doesn’t need to end when you get behind the wheel of an EV – Fuel Card Services is committed to helping all fleets and businesses with their energy transition. That’s why we now offer a range of EV Solutions, from charging on the road with EV Charge Cards, to help with charging your company vehicles at home.

PLVs are becoming a more attractive option both for personal transport and commercial use. This is, in part, because improvements made to electric vehicle technology in recent years could hugely benefit the environment – but they could also have practical advantages over potentially larger, clunkier vehicles when it comes to urban mobility.

As fleet operators of all shapes and sizes start to question the role of PLVs in society and within commercial fleets, we’d like to shine a light on everything PLVs to help contextualise how they’re impacting transport today.

What is a PLV?

For starters, a PLV is a Powered Light Vehicle. This term simply describes two, three, or four wheeled vehicles that are used to transport cargo or passengers. When compared with Light Commercial Vehicles (LCVs) or Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs), they’re significantly smaller, weigh less, and are consequently much better suited to urban areas.

The benefits of PLVs

Increasingly, advances in electric technology mean that PLVs available in market today often come in fully electric or hybrid models, which reduce or eliminate the carbon impact of these much-needed vehicles. This matters to businesses, partly because the correlation between carbon emissions and global warming is hugely in the public eye, but also because its possible legislation will be announced in 2021 around introducing a cost of carbon.

If, or when a cost of carbon is announced, the need for a long-term, sustainable business strategy will quickly increase for UK fleet operators – and so PLVs could play a major role in saving costs and protecting the environment in future.

The benefits of PLVs for commercial fleets in particular go beyond sustainability, though. There’s also the practical nature of having access to more compact vehicles that can access urban areas without becoming a source of congestion to consider. For those operating fleets within cities, having two-wheeled electric vehicles that can niftily dart around to safely make deliveries in heavily populated areas could reduce transit times for cargo substantially.

Sometimes personal cars just aren’t practical, and so the lower transit times that PLVs can bring to the table typically mean that either less vehicles are needed to move cargo, or that growth opportunities appear as fleets find themselves with more and more availability.

The disadvantages of using PLVs commercially

We’ve reached a tipping point where electric technology is of a sufficient quality to make PLVs commercially viable. That doesn’t mean, though, that the technology is perfect.

Fleet operators must take the time to carefully consider whether replacing their existing vehicles with PLVs makes sense in terms of:

• Powering the vehicles. Is there sufficient access to electric vehicle charging points needed to sustain your operations? What sort of charging times will your fleet face, and how expensive is charging these vehicles likely to prove?
• Carrying capacity. If you’re currently operating with a fleet of personal cars and you’re thinking of switching to PLVs, how will this impact the cargo capacity of your fleet? This is the kind of conversation you’ll want to have with a PLV seller to create an informed plan.

One final potential disadvantage of PLVs to keep on your radar is that safety regulations could be a concern. In a 2019 report, the Low Carbon Vehicle Partnership found the current UK safety regulations that apply to PLVs could be problematic. The existing regulations that apply to passenger cars means that the vehicles have to pass crash safety tests, however PLVs are not covered by this legislation.

Some PLV manufacturers build their vehicles to match existing crash specifications regardless, but this technically isn’t a legal requirement just yet – which could bring about a backlash from drivers or pedestrians as these vehicles are brought into a fleet.

Should I make PLVs a part of my fleet?

To answer this question properly, you’ll have to conduct a thorough analysis of your current operations, and the logistical impact of introducing PLVs to your fleet. Some key things to consider though, are:

Will introducing PLVs be cost-effective?

The government has run various consultations on how a cost of carbon could be introduced via new tax laws. With the UN Climate Change Conference set to happen in Glasgow, November 2021, we may see some concrete plans or international agreements about how carbon should be taxed that have a real-world impact for UK fleet operators in coming years. Definitely one to mark in the diary.

Are you actively utilising your vehicles’ maximum capacity?

If you’re in a position whereby you’ve known for a while that your larger vehicles are constantly being underutilised, with either passenger space or cargo space remaining empty, then PLVs really could be a game-changer for your fleet.

It’s expensive to fuel medium to large-sized vehicles, given their weight, and so if you spot an opportunity to switch out some of your current vehicles for PLVs, you may find yourself reaching 80-90% capacity during commercial transit, rather than 60-70%. Again, it’s key to consider the long-term impact of this efficiency on your business’ profitability.

How long are your delivery routes?

PLVs simply aren’t well-suited to lengthy delivery routes. If you’re travelling from Scotland to Lands’ End, you’re probably going to be better served by innovations in the electric HGV market that will inevitably become commonplace.

However, if you’re frequently conducting last-mile deliveries, then the quiet, low-carbon footprint advantages of electric PLVs could well be relevant to your operations.

How could Fuel Card Services help?

As we see the light commercial usage of PLVs, the quality of electric technology (which currently limits PLVs to an operational range of around 200 miles), and low-carbon initiatives become more prevalent, fleet operators may do well to seriously consider the role PLVs could play in their operations.

In the meantime, fleet operators should take every opportunity available to them to make efficiencies within their current business models. That could mean getting access to cheaper fuel via the right fuel card, or utilising a range of fleet services such as advanced telematics to overcome specific operational challenges.

There are plenty of monetary benefits to owning an electric vehicle, but how does their depreciation compare with ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles?

As EVs become more popular, it can be interesting to compare their performance and costs with ICE vehicles. When deciding whether you want to make the transition to an electric vehicle, depreciation is just as important to consider as performance, range and charging costs.

What is depreciation?

Depreciation refers to the loss of value of a vehicle as soon as it is sold. The decrease in value begins the moment you drive it.

High mileage, damage and lower demand are some of the top causes for this loss of value.

Also, when buying a new car from a dealership, you’re paying a lot of extra money on top. Even if you sold the car back to them the next day, you’d be at a huge loss.

According to the AA, the average new car could lose between 10% and 40% of its value in its first year on the road. Assuming you’re doing plenty of miles, the car will have depreciated by 60% after three years.

If you bought your car for £20,000, you’re looking at getting £8,000 for it after three years.

Can owners of electric vehicles expect to encounter the same dramatic price reduction?

Increased demand for EVs

Due to the lack of demand, EV depreciation has been pretty extreme in the past. There weren’t many people looking to buy used electric cars as the technology advances so quickly, making older cars obsolete quite quickly.

Now, however, the market for electric cars has increased massively.

This is probably due to the fact that car owners no longer see ICE vehicles as a sensible investment. The government plans to ban production and sale of new petrol and diesel cars in 2030. With this deadline approaching, many drivers are considering an electric vehicle as their next car.

Similar factors are also pushing more drivers towards EVs. Many cities are adopting low emission zones, including London, Birmingham, Oxford and Bristol. Drivers are keen to get their hands on an electric vehicle as they are exempt from the charges that come with these zones, making EVs a great option for cities.

On top of this, statistics show that many drivers could be saving a huge amount of money on fuel costs if they were driving an electric vehicle. Since charging with electricity has become cheaper than filling up a vehicle with fuel, it is possible to save hundreds of pounds every year depending on your mileage.

Electric vehicle depreciation

So what rate of depreciation should an electric vehicle owner expect? Is it any better than the 60% price reduction seen in ICE cars?

Of course, it depends on the vehicle. Brands such as Tesla, Mercedes and Porsche claim to be subject to the least depreciation. The Porsche Taycan for example is calculated to lose only 23% of its value over 3 years.

However, the Taycan is an extreme example. Statistics suggest that EV drivers can expect their vehicles to depreciate by around 50% over 3 years. The Volkswagen e-Golf will lose around 49%, whilst the BMW i3 will lose 52%.

That figure is an improvement on the 60% depreciation seen by ICE car drivers. It’s not a vast difference, but depending on the specific vehicle you buy, you could end up retaining thousands of pounds when you go to sell your car.

Along with the lower total cost ownership (TCO), the less extreme depreciation is another financial benefit to owning an electric vehicle.

What causes the depreciation of EVs?

There are other factors outside of your control. For example, your brand of vehicle could develop a negative reputation; people might believe it is not a reliable vehicle. In this case, you’re going to get less money for it regardless of how well maintained it is. If a newer model of your vehicle is made, your vehicle is likely to depreciate, as there will be more demand for the newer model.

It looks as though depreciation isn’t something that EV owners need to be worrying about for the time being. As the transportation industry adopts electric vehicles more and more every year, their demand is likely to increase.

If you are considering transitioning to electric vehicles for your fleet or business, get in touch with our expert team today and find out how you can keep costs to a minimum during this process.