Chargemasterhas refuted claims that the UK charging infrastructure is not keeping pace with increasing uptake of electric vehicles.

Chargemaster says its Polar network is equipped to cope with growing EV take-up

The firm’s Polar public rapid charging network has grown by 50% in one year – from 250 units in June 2017 to over 375 today – at a time when the number of electric cars on UK roads has risen by 50% to more than 150,000 units.

Meanwhile the total number of Polar charging points has increased from just over 5,500 this time last year to more than 6,500 now. The vast majority of those are fast charging points (typically 7kW) in destination locations.

The company also said that a lot of demand for chargers is being tackled by the increasing deployment of workplace charging points, to match the continuing rollout of home charging points.

Chargemaster continued: “We have gone from a few years ago, a company director phoning us to get a cost for putting a single charging point in for their Tesla, to today getting daily calls and emails from HR and facilities managers, as well as other directors, requesting costs for significant charge point installations at their workplace for employees and fleet vehicles – in some cases running into the hundreds of charging points.”

David Martell, chief executive of Chargemaster, finished: “The idea that charging infrastructure is not keeping pace with the growing market of EVs is false – there is already existing capacity in the network, and we will continue to ensure that drivers have an expansive and reliable public charging network.”