IRELAND needs to ramp up the installation of electric vehicle public chargers to honour its climate commitments, according to John Mullins, Fine Gael European election candidate for Ireland South.
A 2023 all Ireland study by the Irish EV Association (IEVA) showed more than four in five respondents had low confidence in the infrastructure available to facilitate the adoption of EVs, while 72% of those surveyed believe targets of one million EVs in Ireland by 2030 will not be achieved.
While the majority of EV users charge at home, John Mullins believes there exists a pressing need for more public charge points, to serve those who don’t have access to a charger at home or in the workplace, and to facilitate longer journeys.
‘The government aims to have 180,000 EVs on our roads by the end of next year, and while public chargers are being installed by private companies on a continuous basis, the pace of this is behind what it needs to be, to adequately serve those who might want to go electric but don’t feel confident doing so yet because of a lack of public infrastructure,’ he said.
A recent study by the European Federation for Transport and Environment sustainable transport umbrella group Transport & Environment (T&E), has shown that there has been a three-fold increase in the number of EV public chargers in the EU in the last three years, with the charging network growing faster last year than the electric vehicle fleet.
However, Ireland lags behind its European counterparts in this regard, meeting less than 50% of its targets, he said.
‘If we want to propel the movement of EV driving in Ireland, we need to prioritise the rollout of public charging, not just on motorways and in major urban areas, but in small towns and villages up and down the country.
Green transport is a crucial part of the country’s climate policy and we’re not taking it seriously enough.
‘There’s been a significant uptake in EV sales in Ireland in recent years, but consumer confidence is dipping, and will continue to do so, if the government doesn’t work in tandem with the private sector in moving on with much-needed infrastructure,’ he concluded.
