Tritium wins big UK electric vehicle charging deal

Tritium, the Brisbane-based electric vehicle charging station company backed by coal entrepreneur Trevor St Baker, has won a deal to install charging stations at 2500 locations in the United Kingdom for fast-growing group Box Energi.

Tritium, which has installed 3000 of its fast-charging stations around the world in 29 countries, aims to eliminate ”range anxiety” which has been a handbrake on the take-up of electric vehicles. Many drivers are still worried they will only be able to travel relatively short distances before having to re-charge their vehicles.

The first 100 of the charging station locations under the UK deal are scheduled to be up and running by the end of January, 2020. Box Energi has appointed Tritium to be the sole provider as it builds out a comprehensive network to be known as the Drive Energi network.

Many of the sites will have two Tritium Veefil-RT 50kW DC Rapid Chargers, which the company says is capable of adding 100km of extra range in 20 minutes of charging.

Other longer-charging options will also be available at the sites. Tritium already has a big presence in Norway, making up about half the market for fast-charging stations in a country which is a global leader in electric vehicles.

Tritium’s business development manager for the United Kingdom and Ireland, Kevin Pugh, said the new network would build more confidence among electric vehicle drivers, with charging infrastructure crucial as new anti-pollution measures increasingly come into place in London.

Authorities in the UK are implementing a new Ultra Low Emission Zone scheme to tackle air pollution, which in practical terms will penalise drivers of older vehicles with higher emissions. The scheme began in April in central London and hits drivers with a £12.50 ($22) charge if they are behind the wheel of a vehicle with high emissions.

Mr Pugh said the need for reliable and easy-to-use charging infrastructure was ”critical”.

“A single 20-minute charge will add about three days of range to an EV,” Mr Pugh said.

All of the 2500 charging station locations are due to be operating by 2025.

Electric vehicles have been much slower to take off in Australia than in the more densely populated markets of Europe. In Europe in particular, governments have been prioritising the rollout of electric vehicles by offering subsidies and incentives. Labor leader Bill Shorten was aggressively pursuing measures to sharply accelerate electric vehicles take-up in Australia in the lead-up to the May 18 election, won convincingly by Prime Minister Morrison.

Australia is among the top 20 nations for new car purchases with annual sales topping 1.1 million across the entire new car market, but electric vehicles only make up about 1 per cent of sales.

Drive Energi chief executive James Moat said the Tritium technology was proven and ideal for densely populated areas because it only took up limited space.

Fast-charging was very important to UK motorists. The Tritium fast chargers were about 14 times quicker than regular charging infrastructure. The most common 7kW chargers found in many households and some public sites in the UK could only add about 14km of extra distance to an electric vehicle after a 20-minute charge.

Tritium has also been entrusted with the job of providing around-the-clock on-site support for the network of stations, which transmit data to engineers who are on call to fix any problems.

Tritium first launched its fast-charge stations onto the market in 2014. The company operates innovation centres in Brisbane and Amsterdam, and also has offices in Los Angeles as it expands in the US market.

Source : afr.com