Jaguar Land Rover installs UK's largest electric vehicle smart charging facility

Published by

Nicky Godding

Jaguar Land Rover has installed 166 smart charging outlets for electric vehicles at its Gaydon engineering centre near Warwick to encourage employee uptake of electric vehicles.

Charging points will also be installed in the visitors’ car park. This smart charging network is believed to be the largest single installation of its kind in the UK.

The 7kW AC smart charging stations, supplied by NewMotion (a Shell company), can add 22 miles of range to an all –electric Jaguar I-PACE every hour and 176 miles in total during an eight-hour day. The stations are cloud-connected and integrated with the NewMotion public charging network, so employees can charge at stations across Europe using a single card. Users can also monitor and track charging throughout the day with a smartphone app.

The charge points will offer both financial and environmental benefits for PHEV and BEV drivers alike, while providing a convenient and sustainable solution for employees who can’t charge at home.

Jaguar Land Rover sources 100 per cent renewable electricity – generated from natural resources including solar and wind energy – for its UK facilities, which will be used to power the infrastructure, providing carbon-free commuting to employees.

Jaguar Land Rover’s electricity supply is backed by Renewable Energy Guarantees of Origin (REGO), meaning a proportion of EDF Energy’s renewable energy is ring-fenced for the company. In this case, the REGO scheme certifies that Jaguar Land Rover’s entire supply comes from renewable generation.

Mike Cameron, head of e-mobility at Jaguar Land Rover, said: "Every new Jaguar and Land Rover model line will be electrified from 2020. We have already introduced a portfolio of electrified products across our model ranges, including fully electric (BEV), plug-in hybrid (PHEV) and mild hybrid (MHEV) vehicles. The Jaguar I-PACE, Jaguar’s first premium battery electric vehicle, arrived in showrooms in March 2018 and has since won 55 international awards including European Car of the Year 2019. We hope that by providing a network of electric charging points to staff and visitors at our Gaydon engineering centre we can help encourage the uptake of alternative fuels amongst our employees."

Sytse Zuidema, CEO of New Motion, said: "Our data shows when EV drivers are charging their car, 40 per cent of the time this happens at work. Converting the parking spaces at Gaydon into the largest single site with smart charging locations provides that workplace charging opportunity to Jaguar Land Rover’s employees while our NewMotion charge card gives them access to the largest roaming charging network in Europe."

Currently 75 per cent of EV users are unable to charge their cars at work in the UK. The first phase of workplace charging will provide 166 smart charging spaces for electric vehicles at Jaguar Land Rover’s engineering centre in Gaydon before further chargers are installed at additional UK sites.

Nicky Godding

Nicky Godding is editor of The Business Magazine. Before her journalism career, she worked mainly in public relations moving into writing when she was invited to launch Retail Watch, a publication covering retail and real estate across Europe. After some years of constant travelling, she tucked away her passport and concentrated on business writing, co-founding a successful regional business magazine. She has interviewed some of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs who have built multi-million-pound businesses and reported on many science and technology firsts. She reports on the region’s thriving business economy from start-ups, family businesses and multi-million-pound corporations, to the professionals that support their growth and the institutions that educate the next generation of business leaders.