Uber is building its own EV charging network in London

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By Matthew Griffin Future Transport 10th April 2017

WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF

Uber wants to roll out more electric vehicles in London but London’s lack of EV infrastructure means it’s got to build its own network

Uber, who’ve been facing numerous setbacks recently from scandals to crashes that caused it to suspend its self-driving car program just last month, have announced they’re expanding their relationship with Nissan, who recently tested it’s self-driving cars around the UK’s capital, and increase their fleet of electric vehicles in London.

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The two companies have announced their commitment to deliver an additional 100 Nissan LEAF EV’s, trebling the number of electric vehicles (EV) available via Uber’s app, and to power them Uber has announced that it’s going to build its own EV charging network.

Last August Uber announced it had teamed up with Nissan and another car maker, China’s BYD, then, in the following months the company offered its top rated drivers a mix of zero emission BYD E6s and Nissan LEAF EV’s. But now BYD is no longer part of the pilot and Nissan, who make it’s LEAF in Sunderland in the UK, is firmly in the driving seat.

Before Uber announced the new scheme though the UK’s Energy Saving Trust (EST) conducted a three month feasibility study of the program to assess its impact. The early conclusions of the project showed that over 35,000 riders took a trip in a fully electric car, saving half a metric tonne of nitrous oxide and 22 metric tonnes of CO2 compared to a hybrid cars. But the report also highlighted a number of issues with London’s current EV charging infrastructure and found that drivers were hampered by a lack of fast charging stations in central London where there were just a paltry three available. This explains why Uber is now investing in building out its own EV charging network.

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To begin with, Uber says the new EV charging points will only be available to drivers who use the Uber app, which doesn’t help fix London’s availability issue in the short term, but the company says it open them up for others to use in the future.

“We believe that new technology can help tackle the challenge of air pollution in the capital. Londoners already associate Uber with hybrid cars, but we want to go even further with more drivers switching to fully electric ones,” said Jo Bertram, Regional General Manager of Uber UK.

“Our vision is for mass adoption of fully electric cars as private hire vehicles but there are some really big challenges we need to overcome. Charging cars can be costly for drivers and there’s a serious lack of rapid charging points in central London. We hope the Mayor’s forthcoming transport strategy will lead to more chargers which private hire drivers can use.”

Matthew Griffin / About Author

Described by NASA as a "Walking Encyclopaedia of the Future" and one of the world’s most in demand keynote speakers Matthew Griffin, Founder and Futurist in Chief of the 311 Institute, a global Futures and Deep Futures advisory firm, is a multi-award winning Futurist and strategic foresight expert, author, lecturer, mentor, podcast and YouTube host.

With a distinguished career running global business units at Atos, EMC, and IBM today Matthew helps leaders and titans of industry from all over the world explore the impact of the inter sections of technology, culture, and leadership, then helps them create high performance organisations that can continuously disrupt, outpace, and outthink their competition.

15 times author of the hit series the Codex of the Future series Matthew's ability to identify, track, and explain the impacts of hundreds of emerging technologies and trends on global business, culture, and society has earned him a powerful reputation and a roster of clients that include royal households, world leaders across the G7, G20, and G77, and many of the world's most recognised and exceptional organisations including ABB, Accenture, ABN Amro, Adidas, AON, ARM, BCG, Centrica, Citi Group, Coca Cola, Deloitte, Dentons, Disney, Dow, EY, Google, KPMG, Lego, Microsoft, Legal & General, LinkedIn, Nokia, Paramount, PepsiCo, PWC, Qualcomm, RWE, Samsung, T-Mobile, UBS, Visa, WIRED, WPP and hundreds of others.

Matthew is regularly featured in the global media including the AP, BBC, Bloomberg, CNBC, Discovery, Forbes, Khaleej Times, Telegraph, TIME, ViacomCBS, WIRED, and the WSJ, and his mission is to help organisations create a fair and sustainable future whose benefits are shared by everyone irrespective of their ability, background, or circumstances.