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Electric vehicles join electricity firm’s fleet.jpg Britain’s larges ...

Electric vehicles join electricity firm’s fleet.jpg Britain’s largest electricity distributor, UK Power Networks, is using electric vehicles (EVs) for the first time. It has bought three new Peugeot iOns to join its fleet of cars and vans which are regularly seen on the roads across London, the South East and the East of England en route to power cuts, upgrades or new connections projects. The EVs will be driven in London and Kent by engineers and technical staff working on connections, maintenance, upgrades and Low Carbon London business. They have a range of 93 miles and the company has installed specialist charging infrastructure at its offices in Canning Town, Elephant and Castle, Maidstone, Dartford and Eltham to cater for them. Rapid charging points will achieve an 80% charge in 30 minutes, compared to seven hours to charge the vehicles from a normal domestic electricity supply. The new cars will automatically become part of UK Power Networks’ Low Carbon London electric vehicle trials, which are studying the habits of London’s EV drivers. Currently, the trials are monitoring 51 commercial charge points, 720 publicly-accessible charging points and 31 residential charge points, which will increase over the coming months. Chris Pascall, head of transport at UK Power Networks, said: ‘We have estimated that the whole life cost of the iOn will be no more than an equivalent small diesel car. These are still relatively new technologies so we will be taking into account the original outlay, battery life, range and other issues as we increase our understanding of what the market has to offer and how it can help us in the future.’

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