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NETWORK / 28 / JULY/AUGUST 2016 ELECTRIC VEHICLES E lectric vehicles (EVs) are not a niche technological fad. They may only currently represent less than 1% combined market share across the world's largest markets for new passenger cars, but this is set to change, and quickly. EVs have a central role to play in meeting the ambitious emissions reduction targets needed in the transport sector to avoid global warming. Transport accounts for around 25% of the UK's CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions. In comparison with vehicles running on diesel or petrol, EVs are respnsible for significantly less CO2 and also cut the amount of harmful nitrous oxide emitted. As electricity increasingly becomes the fuel of choice, electricity network operators have never needed to monitor developments in another sector more closely. For their operations, EVs are a double-edged sword. EV charging will be an additional pressure on already stressed local distribution grids, with human behaviour likely to lead to "clusters" in particular areas as the technology is adopted. But managed correctly, closer integration of the energy and transport sectors could provide solutions for problems that already exist in the energy sector, such as the intermittency of renewables, and a need for electricity storage. The World Energy Council predicts that the combined market share of EVs will increase to 16% by 2020, and the Netherlands and Norway are already intending to implement an all-EV policy for cars by as early as 2025. Britain has its own ultra-low emission adoption targets, and although these are considerably less ambitious, preparation time for DNOs ahead of mass adoption is running short. DNOs are already undertaking projects to equip themselves via schemes like Scottish and Southern Energy Power Distribution's My Electric Avenue project. The Network Innovation Competition-funded project trialled EV charging management technology, which if adopted by DNOs could save £2.2 billion in network reinforcement costs by 2050. Western Power Distribution has also launched an EV project that it claims will be the largest in the world. The project will develop a modelling tool for monitoring the effect of EVs on low-voltage networks, and investigate the economic and technical feasibility of EV and vehicle-to-grid demand control. Cooperation between the transport and energy sectors is also revving up. A cross- sector group has been set up in the wake of My Electric Avenue to facilitate collaborative working, and Nissan is to work with Italian distribution system operator Enel on vehicle-to-grid charging in the UK this year. UK growth Sales of pure plug-in electric cars rose by more than 20,000% between 2010 and 2015, from 138 to 28,188 in the UK. This exponential growth is likely to continue. Since the beginning of this year, Britain has marked itself out as a leader in EV adoption. A total of 10,496 electric cars were sold in Britain between January and March, equating to one every 13 minutes. This puts Britain second in Europe to the Netherlands – one of the countries already intending to implement EV policy and undergoing trials to manage electricity demand using EVs – for the sale of EVs. More significantly, over the same time period 17,000 EVs were sold in the United States –a country with a population five times greater than Britain's. Growth will likely be bolstered over the next period by the ra¤ of new models due to be released over the next year, and the extension of the Government Plug-in Car Grant at the end of last year. The UK government has called its vision for the transport sector "clear and hugely Launched in 2011, the grant offers up to £5,000 to encourage people to purchase greener cars. ULEV cars are fairly expensive, coming in at around £20,000 for even a small model. In the first quarter of 2011, 109 claims were made, rising to 8,453 in the same period in 2015. In March 2016, three categories were introduced to recognise varying levels of efficiency to encourage uptake of the greenest models. ULEVs include electric, plug-in hybrid and hydrogen- powered cars. What is the Government PluG-in Car Grant? the most PoPular PluG-in Cars in the uK are: u mitsubishi outlander Phev – almost 20,000 models sold by the first quarter of 2016 u nissan leaf – almost 12,500 vehicles registered by the end of June 2016 u BmW i3 – 4,065 registrations across both the all-electric and range-extender variants u renault Zoe – 3,918 sold at the end of June u tesla model s – 3,000 u toyota Prius Plug-in – 1,650 Source: DfT Vehicle Licensing Statistics DID YOU KNOW electric car registrations (uK) 2014-2016 Electric car registrations Percentage total registrations 8,000 7,000 6,000 5,000 4,000 3,000 2,000 1,000 0 Jun 14 Jul 14 Aug 14 Sep 14 Oct 14 Nov 14 Dec 14 Jan 15 Feb 15 Mar 15 Apr 15 May 15 Jun 15 Jul 15 Aug 15 Sep 15 Oct 15 Nov 15 Dec 15 Jan 16 Feb 16 Mar 16 Apr 16 May 16 Jun 16 Source: Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, July 2016. 2.0% 1.8% 1.6% 1.4% 1.2% 1.0% 0.8% 0.6% 0.4% 0.2% 0.0% 0.5% 0.7% 0.9% 1.1% 1.3% 1.0% 0.9% 1.2% 0.8% 0.9% 0.9% 1.1% 1.0% 1.3% 1.7% 1.3% 1.4% 1.4% 1.2% 1.2% 649 929 515 3,090 1,706 1,851 2,141 1,708 728 6,104 1,471 1,859 2,184 1,579 879 1,912 1,828 2,276 3,090 2,176 1,176 2,560 2,345 3,196 7,144