In an unsurprising move towards a more eco-friendly city, Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, recently announced that he aimed to have 1,300 public charge points for electric cars installed around the metropolis. In addition to his recent introduction of rental bikes to London, Johnson is trying to bring the capital around to a new way of thinking – at least, where petrol is concerned. Cyclists and hybrid drivers are definitely those in his sights.
It’ll be interesting to see how this pans out. We already know that the bike rental scheme is operating at a financial loss, much as the bus and underground journey also does. It’ll also be interesting to see an entire city take up electric vehicles, though quite how that’ll work is beyond us, given that they won’t be able to drive up north to see their family if the car runs out of juice halfway up the M1. Watching car insurance giants like Aviva give deals to those with electric motors and comparing them to petrol cars should also give some indication of the view of eco-friendly transportation from the perspective of the industries surrounding motoring.
Zero-emission vehicles, however, may turn London into one of the greenest cities on the planet overnight – a significant portion of London’s emissions come from cars, buses, and motorcycles, and switching to electric power would wipe out this statistic completely. For those worried about the ever-depleting amounts of fossil fuels underneath the earth’s surface, this is great news. In the USA, there are also a lot of financial incentives for driving electric, from tax credits and rebates to free recharges and parking.
However, you won’t be getting very far – drive more than a 100 miles and even the latest electric car battery may fail you. Like the rental bikes, Johnson may in fact ignore London outside the boundaries of the inner city, so for those commuting, running out of charge may in fact beach people randomly around London, turning the M25 into a scene from Deep Impact.
So if you live in London and you’re about to switch vehicles, perhaps go for a hybrid first – you can get the moral boost from owning an eco-friendly car, but you won’t have to worry about finding a charge point, as if the whole city takes up Johnson on his offer, 1300 isn’t even going to scratch the surface of the demand it may create. Now, where’s that Hummer?
