Portsmouth is forecast to have over 38,000 electric vehicles by 2034, so the council needs to plan for the city’s electric vehicle future.

There already many electric vehicles (EVs) in the city, and the number is only set to increase in the future. To meet this increasing demand, Portsmouth City Council will discuss the Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (EVI) Strategy, which details plans to support electric vehicle adoption in the city by enabling and supporting access to EV charging infrastructure.

The strategy will be brought to a forthcoming Transport Decision Meeting for adoption, scheduled for 11 July, to support future EV initiatives in the city.

The EVI strategy is designed to outline the council’s ambitious plans to expand the city’s chargepoint network to support residents, commuters, visitors, and transport and fleet operators in the transition to electric vehicles. This strategic approach will allow the council to provide EV infrastructure in areas it’s most needed.

More electric vehicles are forecast to appear on the city’s roads in the future, and the strategy will aim to meet this growing demand for a variety of reliable, publicly accessible chargepoints across the city, promoting cleaner air and addressing the climate emergency.

Portsmouth faces unique challenges in delivering EV infrastructure, with a narrow street network and low level of private residential off-street parking needing innovative and collaborative solutions. The EVI strategy will address these challenges by supporting residents, visitors to Portsmouth, businesses and vehicle fleets operators, as well as car club and public transport operators.

It details plans to install both on-street and off-street public chargepoints to support private EV drivers, as well as how to support local vehicle fleets like taxis, shared vehicles like car clubs, and public transport to transition to electric vehicles, as well as encouraging private car park operators to become part of the city’s public chargepoint network.

To help deliver these ambitious changes, the council have been successful in a bid for £887,430 in funding from the Office for Zero Emission Vehicles (OZEV) for up to 320 more lamp column chargers across the city as part of the third phase of the On-street Residential Chargepoint Scheme (ORCS). The procurement approach for this phase, as well as formal adoption of the EVI strategy will also be discussed at the Transport Decision Meeting.

Additionally, a further £3,682,000 from the Department for Transport’s Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (LEVI) fund has been allocated to support the installation of more public chargepoints, to help residents to charge their electric vehicles (EVs) even if they don’t have off-street parking.

The strategy was developed collaboratively with input from various stakeholders and underwent extensive public consultation from 18 September to 29 October 2023. 485 responses were received, reflecting a broad range of perspectives across age groups and geographic areas.

Cllr Peter Candlish, Cabinet Member for Transport said: “We know that more and more electric vehicles are likely to be on our streets in the coming years, so it’s vital that we discuss our strategy for making the city EV friendly, as well as how we can best use funding for EV drivers and owners in Portsmouth.”

There have been recent and ongoing issues with some EV chargepoints in the city, after the Distribution Network Operator (DNO) – Scottish and Southern Energy Networks (SSEN) raised a concern about some of the chargepoints.

Efforts are underway to reactivate the remaining chargepoints, and 41 of the existing on-street chargepoints are already back online and available for EV drivers.

Although frustrating, such issues are not unusual when an organisation is an early adopter of new technology. The council has learned from these experiences and is committed to ensuring that any future chargepoints will avoid similar issues when the third phase of the ORCS scheme rolls out.

EV drivers can stay up to date on chargepoint locations and other news by signing up to the council’s newsletter at www.portsmouth.gov.uk/ev-chargepoints.