British electric vehicle supplier Bedeo said on Wednesday it had launched a service to convert thousands of diesel vans to electric hybrids, starting in France, to take advantage of government subsidies for retrofitting fossil-fuel models. The company’s kit lets owners replace the combustion engine with an electric motor, add a battery pack, and install software to manage charging and driving behavior. The service costs about 25,000 euros ($29,600), with the cost of electricity used to power the car included in the price.
EVs have become a vital component of the mobility mix, allowing drivers to avoid the price tag of a new car and recoup the cost from savings on fuel. But there are still barriers to their adoption – for example; people are often concerned about having enough charge points to stop them from getting stranded or running out of power.
A solution could be to repurpose petrol stations as ‘GigaHubs’ that can hold up to 180 cars at once and dispense up to 180 kilowatts of power. The UK’s first EV-only factory started production this week, as Vauxhall’s Ellesmere Port plant rolled out the first vans at its new EV-exclusive operation. It’s making the Vauxhall Combo-e electric van and its Citroen and Peugeot sister models.
It’s a milestone in the UK’s shift to low-carbon vehicles and shows how the government’s plan to have half of all cars on the road by 2040 can be achieved. The plant is also home to the world’s largest refueling station and is expected to handle tens of millions of vehicles annually.
The station, built by BP and the Dutch energy firm Innogy, is designed to support electric vehicles at up to 150 miles per hour. It can charge a fleet of buses or dozens of private electric cars simultaneously. It can deliver up to 180 kilowatts, enough to allow them to journey from London to Birmingham or Manchester without stopping to recharge.
Innogy plans to open a similar site in the north of England next month, which will be able to handle 100 electric vehicles at once. The company is aiming to expand into other European countries, too.
Despite a growing number of EVs on the road, a new survey suggests that many motorists need to learn how to use them. The independent consumer watchdog Transport Focus poll found that 56% of people needed to be made aware of London’s Ultra-Low Emission Zone (ULEZ), and fewer than one in five understood the rules of Oxford’s ZEZ. It also revealed that only 56% of respondents knew the cheapest ways to charge their cars. This is a big problem because charging at home is cheaper than filling up with petrol or diesel – around 5p per mile, according to the car app Zap-Map. But only about half of UK homes have a plug socket. Changing that will be crucial if the country is to have a seamless and safe transition to electric vehicles.
