Jump-start the electric revolution | Letters

Bridget Rosewell calls for a national vehicle charging network; Bob Pike thinks it is good news that car production is plunging; David Flint says the Green party has the right idea

Your story “Electric vehicle drivers at risk by charging from home mains supply” (theguardian.com, 30 May) shows why it is vital that the government provides the right charging infrastructure. After 100 years of incremental change, we are on the cusp of a revolution. The age of the internal combustion engine is being consigned to history. But all too slowly. Today, vehicles contribute to 80% of air pollution breaches in the UK. The National Infrastructure Commission (NIC), in its first published assessment of the UK’s needs to 2050, called for sales of new cars and vans to be all electric from 2030. That will only be achieved with the introduction of a truly national, visible charging network.

More direct and ambitious action is needed to jump-start the change. That means meeting the need where the market will not deliver in the short term; getting local authorities to identify where chargers could most usefully be provided and making the spaces available for them; subsidising the provision of rapid charging points in remote areas by 2022; and it means Ofgem removing barriers to connecting to the network.

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