Electric charging anxiety is a ‘perception’ as drivers find it ‘much easier’ after switch

Laura Huhtasaari questions efficiency of electric cars

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Fiona Howarth, CEO of Octopus Electric Vehicles said the increase of electric charging stations had changed the perception of new vehicles. She warned many drivers find it is “much easier” to top up their car than they initially believed it would be once they had made the switch.

However, she said this was down to a massive deployment in public chargers which has helped kill ‘range anxiety’ concerns.

Speaking to Express.co.uk, she said: “Seeing chargers pop up everywhere [is driving demand].

“The rate of deployment of public chargers now is huge.

“There’s now almost 16,000 places you can charge your car, it’s nearly double the number of places you can fill up your petrol car.”

According to EDF Energy, there are now more than 42,000 charging connectors at 15,500 sites.

They said 7,000 extra charging points were installed in 2020 alone with the Government now committed to expanding private charging bays.

Ms Howarth said: “In addition, almost 70 percent of us can charge at home.

“There’s a lot of us that no longer have to detour for diesel, we can fill up from home like our mobile phone and start each day with a full charge.

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“It’s significantly more convenient in that scenario.

“And we have got lamppost charging popping up on our streets.

“Even if you don’t have a driveway you can ask your council to install charging in your lamp posts so you can get an electric car and still charge outside your house.”

Her comments come just weeks after the Competitions and Markets Authority (CMA) warned access to charging stations can be a “postcode lottery”.

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