Town hall looks to electric vehicles

An all-electric civic car has already replaced one of the authority’s two ageing petrol-driven cars used by the Lord Mayor and the Deputy Lord Mayor.

Coun Daren Hale, chairman of council-owned contractor KWL, said they would seek to be one of the first in the country to test electric vans, if KWL’s bid to take over the fleet from the council goes through.

The councillor said as well as cutting emissions, the vehicles would be far cheaper to run – although costing more at the outset.

Coun Hale, who is also the council’s deputy leader, said: “We’d want to work towards a sizeable chunk of the fleet being electric. The charging costs are only about 8p per night which is incredible as opposed to £1.35 a litre. The vans are more expensive, but the charges are coming down.”

The £29,000 Nissan Leaf saloon, which replaced a six-year-old Rover Saloon, was provided free by its manufacturer. Hull currently has 60 charging points, mostly located in multi-storey car parks across the city.

The makers claims the car costs less than 1.5p per mile to run.