Ministers appear to have cut Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (LEVI) funding to local authorities by tens of millions over the next two years.
The Department for Transport (DfT) said it was launching the £381m LEVI fund alongside an additional £15m for the On-Street Residential Charging Scheme (ORCS), which together will support the installation of tens of thousands of new chargers across the country.
In last year’s electric vehicle infrastructure strategy, the DfT said it would invest at least a further £500m from 2022 to 2025 to support local authorities to plan and deliver local public charging infrastructure, including the £450m LEVI Fund, and the £50m ORCS scheme.
This was in addition to £10m in 2022-23 for local authorities to run LEVI pilots. The DfT added that the LEVI Fund always included up to £50m ‘capability’ funding.
While previous funding packages have been announced from ORCS, the apparent fundign cut, which could range from £30m - £50m seems to have come from the LEVI. Transport Network has approached the DfT for comment.
Last summer, the DfT annouced £20m for nine LEVI pilot areas, then last month it announced £22m to expand three of the original LEVI pilots, and add 16 new pilot areas. It also announced the launch of an ‘£8 million LEVI Capability Fund’.
The latest announcement of £381m includes both capital and capability funding, including capability funding for 2022-23. It is not clear to what extent it includes previously announced cash but the DfT did include a list authorities from previous LEVI announcements.
The DfT also unveiled its proposals for a zero emission vehicle mandate which, from next year, will set minimum annual targets for the percentage of new car and van sales that must be zero emission.
In addition, it opened the second application round of the £165m Advanced Fuels Fund for the aviation sector, of which half was allocated in December.
Transport secretary Mark Harper said: 'Transport is one of the most important sectors for achieving net zero by 2050, and so we must accelerate our efforts to decarbonise how people get from A to B while growing our economy and supporting thousands of green jobs.
‘From expanding our charging network to boosting the production of cleaner aviation fuel, today’s announcement is a great stride forwards - offering people more choice on how to stay connected while delivering the carbon reductions needed to achieve net zero.’
