Thursday 13 March 2014

3000 electric cars and 6000 charge points for London car club


Londoners will be able to hire Bollore electric cars and drop them off at any one of thousands of charging points in a system billed as the automotive equivalent of the “Boris bike” scheme.

Drivers will typically be charged £5 for a half-hour journey plus a £5 per month membership. The first 100 vehicles will be on the streets next March and they will have a range of 150 miles.

Bolloré, the French battery experts behind Paris’ Autolib car hire scheme, pledged to extend the existing London network of 1,300 charging points to 6,000 by 2018.

Company president Vincent Bolloré said the first priority was to unify the existing Source London system of 1,300 charging points which have had poor take-up, with three quarters unused last year. He said: “I believe that London could be the world’s most advanced sustainable transport city and our announcement today is another step on the path to this goal.

“The number of electric cars in the capital will only increase if the people of London can rely on a charging infrastructure which is in place across London and its boroughs.

“Electric car sharing has been tremendously popular in Paris and we believe it could be as equally successful in London, offering people a convenient andlow-cost form of environmentally-friendly transport.” Mayor Boris Johnsonsaid: “We’re going to see more charging points popping up across London, which will drive the take-up of these cleaner, greener machines and help to reduce air pollution too.”

Critics say the Mayor has wasted years and millions of pounds on the Source London scheme. Liberal Democrat Assembly member Stephen Knight said: “The adoption of electric cars is proving to be painfully slow.”