The responsibility for administering more than 3,000 public electric vehicle charge points across Scotland will no longer rest with the government agency set up 12 years ago. The ChargePlace Scotland contract is due to end this year, with responsibility passing to local authorities who may partner with private companies to manage the infrastructure.
This comes as the number of new EVs on Scotland’s roads has rocketed and the corresponding demand for chargers in Scotland has increased dramatically year-on-year. It is estimated that around 50,000 of the 760,000 UK-registered EVs are in Scotland, says The Herald.
Transport Scotland – the government agency at the helm of driving forward the EV transition to assist the country’s goals of reaching Net Zero climate change targets – say the pace and scale of investment in the public charging network will need to increase over the coming years.
A spokesperson said: “It will be unsustainable for the public sector to deliver this alone.
“November 2025 is essentially a watershed moment for EV drivers – all public charging networks will essentially become open to all – drastically improving accessibility and ease of use. It will also offer greater consumer choice, for example, drivers will be able to choose roaming providers that will allow them to bundle home energy tariffs.
“ChargePlace Scotland already has partnerships with the main UK roaming providers and its users are starting to sign up to those roaming platforms due to the benefits it offers them, not least the ability to easily access Scotland’s wider public charging network, of which CPS now represents less than 50%. It is anticipated that many more CPS users will join roaming platforms over the next 12 months as they recognise the advantages of doing so.”
ChargePlace Scotland was launched in 2013 by the devolved administration at Holyrood to boost growth of the EV charging infrastructure and hence the uptake of electric vehicles. The five year contract is due to expire mid year. During this time CPS has been the frontline organisation – 5th largest in the UK – for running the country’s public EV charging network. It does not own any of the public charge points.
Over £60 million public and private investment has been made in Scotland’s EV charging. Currently there over 3,000 public charge points across the country with the promise to double the size of the network to 6000 chargers by 2026. There are of course thousands more in places such as private businesses, hospitals, schools, car parks, public places and some already controlled by local authorities.
(Pic: Yay Images)
