Charging your Electric Vehicle
Find a Public Charge Point
To enable the switch to electric vehicles (EVs), the Council supports the delivery of a public charging network of EV charge points across the borough.
The Council would recommend looking at ZapMap in order to find charge points in your local area. This gives a live UK-wide map of charging points allowing EV drivers to navigate available charge points within our community and when you are on the move. The link to ZapMap can be found below:
Public Charging in London Borough of Hounslow
There are a number of ways in which you can charge your EV within the borough. The Charge Point Operator (CPO) will charge a fee to EV drivers that chose to charge at their charge points. This fee is usually based on a price per kilowatt hour, operational costs and VAT at 20%.
Slow Lamp Column Charge Points
We have 200 lamp column charge points offering slow charging (approximately 5 kW) across the borough. These charge points were introduced via a resident request led approach before the publication of our Electric Vehicle Charging Strategy in November 2022. Lamp column charge points are used to provide slow charging which is most suitable for residents to charge when parking near their home for long periods of time (8-12 hours).
The Council recently completed a project to dedicate bays adjacent to all lamp column charging points within the borough in line with our Strategic ambitions. This project addressed the concerns raised by EV drivers during the consultation period of the EV Charging Strategy in that petrol and diesel vehicles were consistently parked adjacent to the lamp column charge points thus obstructing the access to the charging infrastructure for EV owners.
In Controlled Parking Zones (CPZs) only EV drivers with a valid permit are able to park and charge during the times of operation within the permitted area. Outside of these hours, the EV bay will be open to all actively charging EVs only. In EV dedicated bays outside of CPZs, only EV drivers are able to park and charge in the dedicated EV bays.
Fast Charge Points
There are 78 Source London fast (7 kW-22 kW) charge points operating within car parks and on-street locations across the borough. A 7kW charge point can provide a full charge in approximately 3 – 5 hours and a 22kW charge point would complete a charge in approximately 2 – 3 hours.
Rapid Charge Points
There are 4 BP Pulse charge points operating in borough owned and maintained car parks. Typically, rapid charge points can charge an EV to 80% in 30 minutes – 1 hour.
Cable Gullies
As part of the development of the EV Charging Strategy, officers had already considered trialling cable channels and after much consideration it was concluded that they do not currently represent an attractive alternative or addition to lamp column charging, due to a number of complexities. Firstly, they create an unacceptable level of risk in terms of maintenance liability and associated costs. They were also considered to pose an increased risk to pedestrians and those with disabilities if deployed at scale along a street. It should also be noted that installation of a gully would not guarantee residents access to the charge point – the space adjacent to the charging point would remain free for anyone to use. The Council would also need to retain the right to remove the point at any time, despite any investment made by the resident or charge point operator, at no cost to the Council. Government guidance on this topic has not yet been able to identify solutions to these issues.
The preferred approach set out in our EV Charging Strategy is therefore to install a network of lamp column charging points at regular intervals in streets without access to off-street parking (within a 30 second walk of each property), with dedicated parking spaces adjacent to the points. This will give residents a greater chance of being able to access a number of charging points in proximity to their property and encourage further uptake of EVs.
Taking the above into consideration, the recommendation not to introduce cable channels still stands. However, the council will keep this under review, informed by continued monitoring of the trials taking place in other local authorities.
Looking Forwards
Hounslow Council published its ambitious Electric Vehicle Charging Strategy in November 2022. The Council are currently in the process to procure charge point operators to deliver charge point infrastructure for slow, fast and rapid charge points across the borough. It is expected that residents with little to no access to off-street parking will be a 30-second walk from a charge point by 2026.
As EV ownership grows the Council recognise that a more strategic, evidence-based approach is required to providing charge point infrastructure across the borough. To find out more about the strategy and public consultation that was undertaken, please visit the Hounslow Electric Vehicle Charging Strategy & Consultation page.
Get in Touch
We understand that EVs and their associated charging infrastructure might be new to many people. If you have a read through the information on these webpages and associated links (see also the Q&A page) and still have questions about how you might be affected, please contact us at:
Email: electricvehicles@hounslow.gov.uk
We aim to respond to your enquiries within 10 working days, so please be assured that a member of the Electric Vehicle Team will get back to you as soon as possible.
