A further £8.2 million of funding has been released by Transport Scotland to help businesses and individuals with buying electric and ultra low emission vehicles (ULEVs).
The plans will support the Low Carbon Transport Loan Fund which provides interest-free loans for people and companies to buy low carbon vehicles. Scooters, motorbikes, and heavy goods vehicles are now eligible for funding for the first time, alongside cars.
It’s all part of the second phase of the Switched On Scotland Plug-In Vehicle Roadmap, following on from the initial 2013 launch. That document identified a number of actions needed for petrol and diesel vehicles to be phased out of Scotland by 2050.
Phase two is ‘An Action Plan For Growth’, and sets out the plans Transport Scotland will carry out in the next three years until 2020.
Focusing on the acceleration of EV uptake, Phase Two is set to support the infrastructure surrounding plug-in cars too. Among the ten actions laid out, the installation of additional EV charge points via the ChargePlace Scotland network is a key aspect.
Other points include the development of EV charging hubs across the country, and improving user experience with the ChargePlace Scotland network.
An update as to what the Switched On Scotland Plug-In Vehicle Roadmap has carried out to date was included in the announcements, with more than 600 charge points installed because of the funding. Almost £4 million has helped support the installation of home charge points at more than 1,100 homes and around 350 businesses.
Last financial year almost 250 projects were supported by the Low Carbon Transport Loan Scheme, with loans of £7.4 million. The loan is funded up until at least 2020, providing up to £35,000 towards the cost of the buying a new electric vehicle, with a repayment term of up to six years. It also provides funding towards the installation of charge points for homes and fleet vehicles.
You can find out more about public EV charging in Scotland by using Zap-Map, with the Filter by Network option available for ChargePlace Scotland points. Charging at Home and Charging at the Workplace help can be found on Zap-Map’s respective pages.
