A Realistic Discussion About the UK EV Industry
And how to make a smooth transition
Author: Luke Justice
Here at CVM, we understand that although electric vehicles (EVs) have lots of benefits, such as lower running costs and minimal carbon emissions, there are drawbacks –range anxiety and high purchase costs are just some of the factors that discourage people from making the switch from their trusty internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles.
But the truth is – at some point in our lifetime, it’s a change nearly all of us will make.
In 2035, no new ICE vehicles will be sold, and so at some point, electric vehicles will be the new normal. However - it absolutely isn’t the chore it’s often made out to be. The UK has come on in leaps and bounds with our electric vehicle charging infrastructure, with a 45% increase in charging points across 2023 alone! In this blog, we’re going to break down some common misconceptions of EVs, while also providing a realistic insight into what to expect when owning one for the first time.
1. The Costs
In terms of price, switching to an EV has never been cheaper in the UK, especially with used EVs beginning to enter the market, driving prices down and increasing accessibility to a larger range of earners. Used EV prices, while of course still higher than the corresponding ICE model, have fallen on average 5.9% year on year, according to Fleet News. The average price of a new EV currently stands at around £30,000 from the 12 cheapest manufacturers, while used EV value stands at closer to £20,000, with some models such as the Toyota Auris selling used for £12,000.
It's interesting to note that in 2023, 3 in 4 of new EVs were registered to fleets, rather than private individuals. This tells us that a huge proportion of our population are being priced out of buying an EV, whereas businesses are able to justify the larger one-time purchase cost in exchange for cheaper total cost of ownership (TCO). This considers the less visible costs, such as charging up, and lifetime maintenance costs on the vehicle. You can see from the below chart that although the list price of EVs are higher, this balance shifts throughout the life of the vehicle into the favour of EVs, saving 10% on average over the lifetime ownership of the EV when compared to its ICE counterpart. This is partially due to the government-mandated incentives such as no road tax needing to be paid on vehicles till at least April 2025.
ABOVE: A chart showing average total ownership costs of an EV and its matching ICE counterpart.
Of course, there are lots of factors to consider – how cheap an EV is to run will be affected by a person’s circumstances. Some reports list public charging as up to 20 times as expensive as home charging, and so if a person can use a charger at home or at work rather than being restricted to public chargers, the total cost of ownership of their EV will be much less. If there’s a way to spread the cost of buying an EV over a longer period to make the payments manageable, or better still, finance it via salary sacrifice through your workplace, this will allow you to access the lower running costs while avoiding the heavy one-time payment.
2. The Practicalities
However, the lower running costs do come with some caveats. However, these caveats don’t mean we should hold out and use ICEs for as long as we physically can – quite the opposite, in fact. When petrol and diesel cars and dying off and everyone on the road is finally having to get used to driving an EV, taking ages at public charging stations, wouldn’t you prefer to be somebody that’s had one for years, knows all the quiet, convenient, and cheap charging spots and can avoid the idiots? The switch to an EV is one that all of us will need to make within our lifetime, if we’re to alleviate the carbon crisis presently facing the planet.
Fortunately, there are tools that can help us make this switch as painless as possible. For example, Zapmap is a website and app that will tell you all the nearest EV charging points to a given route, to ensure minimal time is lost to charging your car. Better still, apps like Zapmap will let you know about any nearby outages, and prioritise rapid and ultra-rapid speed chargers, with 50kW/h and 150kW/h respectively, that will fully charge the average EV in under half an hour. Similarly, apps like PodPoint will allow you to pay through your phone for charging your EV, but of course, the most convenient charging methods will be if your workplace provides charging facilities, or if you can plug in at home.
The major problem arises for those who live in flats or terraced houses, who are limited to parking in communal car parks or on the streets, who are being left out of this transition. It’s also likely that these people live in lower-income households than those who have off-street parking that allows them to charge at home and gain the maximum financial benefit from owning an EV. Therefore, not only are lower earners with no off-street parking less likely to be able to afford the high purchase cost of an EV in the first place, owning one also wouldn’t even be substantially cheaper across the car’s lifetime to provide a financial incentive. The government-mandated lack of road tax on EVs can only do so much – it’s not enough to incentivize the majority of UK residents to make the switch to an EV, especially if they regularly need to make long journeys for work and are restricted to public charging facilities.
3. What Is The UK Doing To Help?
Public charging facilities are being built all the time, and the Great Grid Update by our National Grid is helping to facilitate the increasing power that our growing number of EVs. This is a two-fold operation, with one facet being significant capacity upgrades which will allow the grid to hold more power. There are also constant changes to where we source our power from, as we draw incrementally more power from local sustainable energy, rather than being dependent on fossil fuels from overseas. Below is a comparison of the UK’s power sources over the last 12 years, to give a better impression of our net zero trajectory.