The London borough of Hammersmith and Fulham is installing 55 fast dual-socket electric vehicles (EV) on-street charge points with Liberty Charge. This will create an additional 110 electric parking bays across the borough.
The charge points will be installed by Liberty Charge, the joint venture created by Liberty Global and Zouk Capital to support the roll out of on-street EV charge points in the UK.
The Liberty Charge EV charge points are the first of the newest network operating in the borough. Hammersmith & Fulham now has more than 600 publicly available EV charge points for residents, businesses and visitors to use on its streets – more than 450 of them on lamppost columns, and the network continues to grow. By December 2021, Hammersmith and Fulham is set to pass 1,000 charge points in total.
“When it comes to on-street EV adoption, Hammersmith and Fulham sets a high standard. Its desire to provide its residents with the best charging experience in the country should be commended,” said Neil Isaacson, CEO, Liberty Charge.
The announcement from Hammersmith and Fulham is the latest in a string of London boroughs increasing investment and capacity to reflect the increase in EV drivers with Liberty Charge. In the last few weeks Croydon has deployed 42 charge points, and has planned a further 64 charge points with Liberty Charge. Similarly, earlier this year Waltham Forest has deployed 10 charge points, and has around 50 further sites planned.
“It’s great to be working with Liberty Charge putting in another one of our many electric car charging bays,” said Leader of Hammersmith & Fulham Council, Cllr Stephen Cowan.
“The market for electric vehicles is booming, but in many places the infrastructure is lagging behind, which is holding back progress. That’s not the case in Hammersmith & Fulham where, by Christmas, we will have almost doubled the number of EV points since the summer to over 1,000, and we will continue to add more at pace to make it easier for people to switch to electric.”
“We’re doing our best to tackle climate change and to reach the target of zero net carbon footprint by 2030. This is an important part of our hierarchy of travel solutions that are allowing us to rise to the challenge of climate change. So, not only do you see more electric car charging bays, you see electric scooters, you see cycle lanes, and you see many other measures we’re taking to make it easier for people to travel around in a way that protects our environment.”
Liberty Charge is focused on accelerating this rollout in a bid to help the UK Government meet one of its net zero goals of installing over 120,000 EV charge points by 2025. This will support the UK’s transition from fossil fuel-powered vehicles to electric vehicles as the government works to phase out the sale of combustion-powered cars by 2030.
Liberty Charge works in partnership with local authorities and eMobility stakeholders, such as fleet operators and OEMs, to help deliver on-street charging provision in residential areas of UK cities and towns to serve residents without off-street parking and charging.
Liberty Charge is a joint venture between Liberty Global and Zouk Capital leveraging the build capabilities and network assets of Virgin Media O2, a Liberty Global subsidiary. Zouk Capital is a London-based sustainable infrastructure and growth technology fund manager. Zouk is the fund manager for the UK Treasury’s Charging Infrastructure Investment Fund (CIIF).