Electric car use across Wealden has received a welcome boost as Wealden District Council appoints an EV charging contractor to install vehicle charging points in the district.
Connected Kerb, an EV charging contractor, will review 11 council owned and operated car parks for charging feasibility with the potential to expand to an additional 22 sites throughout Wealden.
Within Wealden there are currently 23 EV charge points distributed throughout the district and the council recognises the need to provide additional public charge points for its residents – particularly as 24% of households with a vehicle park on the street overnight.
The appointment comes after Wealden District Council’s climate emergency declaration, with the intention of working toward net-zero CO2 by 2050 or earlier for both the council and the Wealden district area.
In 2019, transport emissions account for 46.7% of total Wealden district emissions – 19.7% higher than the national average.
Recent research has identified that the potential demand for EV charging across East Sussex will increase over the next 10 years with numbers of EVs locally going from 3,573 to 33,945 (by 2025), to 98,054 by 2030.
This is particularly relevant in Wealden where almost 40% of all EVs first registered in East Sussex in 2021 were in Wealden.
The council’s portfolio holder for Climate Change Councillor Roy Galley said, “As the proportion of electric vehicles grows annually, as does the requirement to provide a reliable, accessible and rigorous charging network to support the growing demand of electric vehicles.
“As part of our commitments under the Climate Emergency Plan, we have successfully appointed Connected Kerb and are delighted to work with the company and share a parallel ambition to boost public charging throughout Wealden.
“Connected Kerb aims to install 190,000 publicly accessible AC chargers in the UK by 2030 and has already worked closely with neighbouring local authorities in Kent and West Sussex.”
As part of the delivery programme, Wealden council intends to utilise On-street Residential Chargepoint Scheme funding, which has already supported 2,038 charge points to date nationally.
