The National Grid has proposed a new ‘superfast’ charging network that would see 90% of all electric car owners within just 50-miles of a charging station.
According to the Financial Times, the proposal would see the creation of around 100 high-powered chargers located along existing networks found under the motorways.
What makes the news so exciting for electric car owners however is not the amount of chargers but the power that they’ll be able to deliver.
All 100 of them would be new 350KW ‘superfast’ chargers that could charge an electric car in 5-12 minutes rather than the current charging times of 20-60 minutes.
A number of German manufacturers (and Ford) have all signed up to a universal charging system known as Combined Charging System that will support the new 350KW network.
At the moment it’s fair to say that electric car owners currently have a dizzying array of choices when it comes to how they charge their cars so manufacturers and governments are keen to start providing some consistency within the network as adoption rates increase.
According to the FT, National Grid put estimates around the construction of the network between £500 million and £1 billion, putting the final cost at around 60 per driver every year.
In addition to these high-powered chargers the government has also proposed increasing the number of urban chargers by converting street lighting to also support roadside charging.