Plugging into the future

Council leads way on electric vehicles
Oldham’s contribution to combating global warming will go live this summer when the borough launches the Manchester Electric Car Company.

Its goal — with the help of a £3.6m government grant — is to set up across Greater Manchester 300 fast-charging points, able to charge a typical electric vehicle in three to four hours, and five rapid chargers able to charge a vehicle in an astonishing 15 minutes.

One of four PODs —electric car one-stop shops which will showcase vehicles, sell, lease, charge and maintain them — is likely to be at the Hollinwood M60 junction.

By this autumn, Oldham will also set up a head office where motorists’ pay bills for the power they use to recharge their batteries using smart cards.

Oldham Council has been put in charge of the initiative by the Association of Greater Manchester Authorities (AGMA) after a successful bid to the Government with Electricity North West, Manchester Airport Group, Peel Holdings, Siemens and Stratton Motors.

Council chief executive Charlie Parker told a meeting of AGMA: “The next two years will be critical to the establishment of an electric vehicle market in Greater Manchester and the UK more widely, and common standards and inter-operability across the country will be very important.

“Our team has already met a cross-section of charge-point suppliers and vehicle manufacturers. We have visited the scheme in Newcastle and met all the other cities during the first meeting of an electric vehicle infrastructure working group.

“The understanding we are gaining will help us ensure delivery of outputs in a timely manner, and value for money.”

But the breakthrough in electric cars is more likely to come from big companies and councils rather than private motorists, Mr Parker believes. He added: “We anticipate that the majority of electric vehicles taken in the early years will be leased by fleet operators keen to exploit their low, whole-life operating costs, rather than by private buyers.”