Petrol stations will be a rare sight by 2020
In Europe the number of petrol stations is on the decline while chrging points for electric cars is poised to outgrow them by 2020
Nissan is claiming that by the year 2020 electric charging points dotted around the UK will outnumber traditional petrol stations.
Nissan’s research counted 8472 stations in the UK in 2016 but expects that number to drop to 7870 in the next four years. By contrast charging points will have risen beyond that to an estimated 7900 locations.
Already 4100 charging points exist in the UK and with more than 115 electric cars registered each day in Q1 2016, Nissan’s calculations might not be as far-fetched as we first thought.
Nissan currently produces the all-electric Leaf in South Africa but the Japanese carmaker is busy with its Future Nissan Lab project which will see a number of re-badged Renault Twizys ready to be summoned by a smartphone app. Future Lab will most likely start in San Francisco before reaching other first world cities where congestion is a problem
That’s just the start with the end plan to return electricity from the cars’ batteries back to the grid which can then be recovered during periods of high demand.
Naturally none of this applies to Africa or even South Africa where the only electric cars are the Nissan Leaf and BMW i3 or BMW i8. There are no public charging points although BMW could build one at the Cape Town Waterfront.
