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Community electric vehicle charging

Have you considered installing an EV charger at your village hall or community building? There are many benefits, operating models and funding options for community EV charging.

If you'd like to know more, then Steeple Morden Parish Council have produced this helpful video guide, based on their experiences of installing a community EV charger.

You can find more information on benefits, operating models, funding and charger types below. 

Benefits of EV charging

Some of the benefits of EV charging include:

  • help for local residents who don’t have their own chargers or do not have private parking
  • attraction of visitors to your area, who can use other facilities at your building/in the wider community while charging their vehicle
  • support of the transition to zero emission vehicles and demonstrating your commitment to combatting the climate crisis

Where can chargers be installed?

Chargers can be installed in the following places:

  • village halls and community building car parks - these are great places for chargers as they are publicly accessible and often run events or host facilities that EV drivers can visit while charging
  • public car parks that are open 24 hours and are within walking distance of homes - a community charger can benefit these residents, especially for overnight charging (your car park will need to have at least 2 parking spaces that can be assigned to EV charging.)
  • near to the electricity supply (typically the village hall/community building) you can keep the installation costs down.

Please note that Parish Councils seeking to operate EVCPS themselves will need to have General Power of Competence to charge customers for energy used by EVCPs.

Types of Charger

The following charge times are from an empty battery life to 80% charge of a 60kWh battery.

  • “Slow” Charger (3kW)
    • 17 hours
  • “Fast” Charger (7, 11 or 22kW)
    • 7kW = 7 hours
    • 11kW = 5 hours
    • 22kW = 2.5 hours
  • “Rapid” Charger (50kW+)
    • 45 minutes

It is likely that “Fast” chargers will be the most suitable speed for communities looking to serve residents and visitors, providing a good balance between charging speed and cost. Due to their increased power, rapid chargers can often require costly and long-winded upgrades to your electricity connection.

Many EV drivers charge their vehicles over night at home, or during the day at places they visit regularly. This is often done using a lower power charge point as this is usually cheaper and makes good use of time when the vehicle is not being driven.

Funding options

Fully funded

There are numerous charger operators that can offer a fully or partly funded operating model for community chargers. These operators fund the installation, operational and maintenance costs of the chargers, and will pay you a rental fee for the use of the charger parking spaces. They will also tend to take any profit made from billing users of the chargers.

Other funded models are run on a community benefit basis, and are funded through selling community shares which are sold by the charger operator.

If you lease the site it is likely you will need at least 15 years remaining on the lease to benefit from this model.

If you think you have a suitable site, you can apply to these operators who will then consider several points including local demographics, physical location and expected usage before committing to an installation.

Grants

The below grant schemes are currently open for applications and can help cover the capital costs of installing your own charge points. This model provides more freedom in selecting your site than the fully funded model described above, but you will also be responsible for organising billing and maintenance of the charge point.

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Scheme Provider Value Eligibility
Electric Vehicle Charge Point Grant  South Cambridgeshire District Council Up to £5,000 capital costs  Parish Councils and owners/operators of community buildings
On-Street Residential Charge Point Scheme UK Government 50% of capital costs, not exceeding £7,500 per charge point  Parish Councils and Local Authorities 

Potential costs

If you install your own charge point rather than going for a fully funded installation, then the costs outlined below may be useful in your decision making. The purchase and installation costs are based on ‘fast’ chargers from 7kW-22kW.

Each charger will need an operating system (also known as a back office) to take payments and interface with the EV.

Please note that Parish Councils seeking to operate EVCPS themselves will need to have General Power of Competence to charge customers for energy used by EVCPs.

Also included are optional additions of a maintenance package provided by the installer, and a module installed on the charger to allow customers to use contactless payment.

Additional options include:

  • Charger purchase and installation - £11,000
  • Annual Charger operating system subscription - £180
  • Annual maintenance package (optional) - £280
  • Contactless payment module (optional) - £1000

Please note that these are estimates at the time of writing (October 2023) taken from an average of quotes received by South Cambridgeshire District Council and applicants to our EV Charge Point Grant, so prices may differ and we would recommend seeking at least three quotes.

Additional resources 

For more information about electric vehicles, EV charging, and other grant funding available for EV chargers you can visit our sustainable travel web page.

The Energy Saving Trust website also has plenty of useful information to help explain EV charging.

Websites like Zap MapCarwow and National Charge Point Registry provide maps of all the public EV charging points available in the United Kingdom. It is advisable to register your charger with them to increase its visibility.

If you have any questions, we can provide help and guidance before and after submitting your grant application. Please get in touch with us at the email address listed below, and we can arrange to discuss your application over the phone or via Microsoft Teams. 

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