Up to 100 new electric vehicle charging points could be installed with Cardiff Council support over the next two years.
The plans are part of a newly published ‘Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Roadmap’to help aid the transition to electric vehicles, which also sets out the local authority’s plan to focus initially on supporting public EV charging in areas with low levels of off-street parking including Heath, Gabalfa, Cathays, Roath, Penylan, Adamsdown, Riverside, Canton, Grangetown and Butetown.
The roadmap forms part of the council’s One Planet Cardiff response to climate change, which aims to reduce the 1.6 million tonnes of carbon emissions created in the city every year, 41% of which currently come from transport.
The new chargers will be predominantly standard chargers (7kW) and some fast chargers (up to 50kW). They will be delivered, operated and maintained at no net cost to the council, in partnership with the private sector through a competitive tendering process. The intention is to install these ‘on street’ or in local car parks.
In tandem with the Councils work it is expected that the number of commercial public sites will continue to grow significantly across the city, leading to in the region of 600-700 charge points in 2025/2026 – up from the current figure of around 200 publicly accessible electric vehicle charging points today.
Cabinet Member for Climate Change, Strategic Planning and Transport, Cllr Dan De’Ath said: “With more and more people making greener choices such as switching to an electric vehicle, demand analysis suggests that there may be a need for around 2,000 public charging sockets in Cardiff by 2030.
“While many charging facilities in the city will be provided commercially or by private households with their own off-street parking, there will be a need for us to ensure that charging facilities are available in areas with little off-street parking – starting with the roll out of another 100 charging points over the next two years.”
With the electric vehicle market continuing to evolve and change rapidly the Council plans to keep its approach under review. The roadmap concludes that in terms of technology options – which include pavement channels, pedestal chargers and street furniture charge points, “there is no silver bullet” and that each technology’s strengths and weaknesses may fit different situations more effectively.
In addition, the Council will explore commercial opportunities for destination charging for fast and rapid charging and policies to support the expansion of charging facilities in the replacement Local Development Plan.
