UK EV charging rollout hampered by planning, grid delays: watchdog

The UK's rollout of public electric vehicle charging infrastructure is being hindered by slow and expensive permitting and grid connection processes, according to a Dec. 13 report by the government's spending watchdog.

The National Audit Office (NAO) said the task of obtaining a grid connection is "increasingly unfit for purpose," potentially resulting in waits of several years when network capacity needs improving — a particular issue for rapid charging sites that require more power.

The watchdog observed a growing number of connection requests, with more and more of those being lodged before a project is ready for them.

The UK's grid connections queue stood at 739 GW as of mid-November, dominated by renewable and energy storage projects. That is about 10 times as much as the UK's existing generation capacity.

A new connections process is set to be implemented in 2025 aimed at weeding out those projects that are not progressing and holding up the queue, allowing others behind them to connect more quickly.

Meanwhile, the Department for Transport is separately working with chargepoint operators and grid operators to identify ways to speed up connections for charging stations specifically, the NAO said.

"To date, there have been improvements in the rate at which connections are made, but the connections queue is still growing," it said.

Beyond grid connections, the NAO took aim at the UK's planning processes, which it said were not created with EV charging in mind.

Operators are required to engage with several bodies, including national and local planning authorities, landowners and grid operators.

For instance, they need a license to install a chargepoint on a public highway as well as permission from landowners when electricity infrastructure crosses private land.

"The process for securing this can be complicated and can take nine to 18 months where a landowner does not co-operate," the NAO said.

In all, the various planning hurdles add complexity, time and cost to the job of installing charging stations, according to the watchdog.

The NAO acknowledged that the government is working to streamline planning as well as considering more "fundamental" reform to make it easier for chargepoint operators to secure planning permission.

"As the volume of chargepoint installations increases, these issues may become more significant if they remain unresolved, but [the Department for Transport] does not know by how much," the NAO said. "For example, planning authorities and other bodies may struggle to process applications as the volumes increase."

The challenges around grid connections and planning cast uncertainty on the UK's ability to achieve its target of having 300,000 public chargers installed by 2030.

For now, the NAO said the country is on track, with more than 64,000 chargepoints online as of July 2024. However, installation forecasts by the Department for Transport do not account for where chargepoints should be installed, it said.

This has created what the NAO described as a "regional divide." Some 44% of public chargers have been installed in London and the southeast of England, while only 15% are in rural areas of England.

The Department for Transport established the GBP450 million ($568 million) Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure fund to help support local authorities rolling out at least 100,000 public chargers by 2025. But the roll-out has faced delays, and an established procurement route proved to be no longer feasible.

The government estimates that the demand for public charging stations in 2030 will be in the range of 250,000 to 550,000.