A report detailing the proposal will be taken to a public Executive meeting on 19 March for approval.

This follows the authority declaring a climate change emergency in 2019 and approving plans to work towards becoming carbon neutral by 2030.

If approved, the council will introduce Fast EV chargepoints to at least a minimum of five per cent of all its long stay parking bays in council owned car parks by 2023.

This will cost circa £800,000 and will be subject to successful external funding bids and reviewed as part of the development of the Local Transport Plan later this year.

To complement the enhanced fast charger network the council is also developing two Hyper Hub sites which will provide state of the art rapid and ultra-rapid facilities. Subject to securing further external funding, a third site is also being developed.

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.

The current tariff of 15 p/kWh, hasn’t been revised since it was set in 2013, so a key element of the strategy is to review the tariff price point.

The council’s 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 20 p/kWh for fast chargers and 25 p/kWh for rapid and ultra-rapid chargers. All new rapid and ultra-rapid units will allow bank card payments for the same 25 p/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.

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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