Search
Close this search box.
Sign up for our weekly Newsletter

CLM offers clients EV experience day

CLM EV day 3 Renault range
Renault range available at the CLM EV experience day

Share

8 February 2018

CLM offered its fleet fleet customers an inaugural EV experience day and well as providing education on EVs.

It involved leading EV manufacturer Renault and the UK’s largest supplier of chargepoints, Chargemaster.

The day, which was attended by fleet decision makers from among CLM’s client base, centred around presentations from both suppliers and fleet managers were then free to get behind the wheel of a number of EVs available for test driving purposes.

CLM EV experience day

  • Opportunity for clients to experience EVs first hand
  • Renault provided EVs for evaluation
  • Tax and operating issues discussed
  • Chargemaster discussed EV charging issues

Renault has the largest line-up of EVs of any European vehicle manufacturer and brought along a number of its award-winning electric models for test purposes, including the Zoe, Europe’s biggest selling EV, the Twizy and the Kangoo ZE.

Claire Atkinson, Renault UK’s manager, leasing (South) & national fleet EV manager, discussed the tax implications of operating an EV compared to a conventional engined car.

She explained that a driver of a typical EV would pay £3,437 in benefit in kind taxation over three years, while the driver of a typical diesel would pay £5,231, some £1,794 more.

Claire said: “Many people of unaware of the problems posed by inner city pollution but 59% of people are living amid illegal pollution levels in the UK, and outdoor air pollution contributes towards 40,000 deaths a year in the UK.

EV experience day
Hands-on experience

“Ministers have been told that 60% of new cars must be electric by 2030 to meet emissions targets but general awareness is low. So EV education days like these with fleet managers are very valuable.”

Jonny Berry, Renault’s regional development manager EVs (South), told attendees that a breakthrough moment on whole life costs (WLC) had now been achieved between EVs and conventional internal combustion engined vehicles.

He compared the WLC of a Ford Connect TDCI with those of a Kangoo Z.E. over four years/30,000 miles per annum. Over this period, the Connect had WLC of £23,187.36, while those of the Kangoo Z.E. were £19,024.80, a monetary saving of £4,162.56, plus a carbon saving of 28.89 tonnes of CO2.

For Chargemaster, EV Experience Centre partnership manager Ben Grocott said that there were now 14,348 chargepoints in the UK, increasing at the rate of 250 per month and making the UK one of the best places in Europe for public charging infrastructure.

He also explained the system of grants available for both to buy EVs and instal chargepoints at home and in the workplace.

A number of delegates were unaware that under the EV homecharge scheme, the registered keeper or lessee of an EV was eligible for a grant of up to £500 of the cost of a charger and installation at their own home.

At the same time, a £300 grant per socket is available for chargepoints in the workplace, up to a maximum of 20 per employer across all sites.

Grocott also explained that grants of up to £4,500 for full EVs, £2,500 for hybrids, up to £8,000 for electric vans and £1,500 for electric motorbikes were also available under the government’s plug-in vehicle grant schemes.

He also described the different charging speeds of the chargers currently on the market, and said that homechargers typically charged at 3kw and took between six and 12 hours to recharge a typical EV.

Fast chargers of the type found in many public places, however, charged at 7kW to 22kW and could recharge a vehicle in three to four hours; while rapid chargers charged at 50kW to 120kW and took only 30 minutes to recharge a typical EV up to 80% capacity.

Chargemaster operates the POLAR recharging network, the UK’s biggest public charging network, which links over 6,000 public charging points. And it also runs, on behalf of Milton Keynes council, the EV Experience Centre in the centre of the town, the UK’s first and Europe’s largest EV education centre.

Grocott said: “We wanted fleet managers to take away from the day just how easy it is to make the transition from diesel or petrol vehicles to EVs and how cost-effective it can be. Feedback we received was very positive.”

CLM managing director John Lawrence said: “Our research has shown that many drivers still require extensive education on the various electric and hybrid powered vehicles on the market before sales start to accelerate towards Government targets.

“Increased education would undoubtedly help this process and this is where fleet management providers like ourselves have a clear role to play in providing our customers with detailed analysis of the options available.”

Share this article

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
WhatsApp
Reddit
Email

Want more motoring news?

Sign up here for our free weekly serving of motoring.

Sign up here for our free weekly serving of motoring.

Latest news

Top