Ride-hailing firm is installing 700 chargers and incentivising its drivers to go electric
JOHN EVANS
Once the bête noire of City Hall, Uber is now leading London’s drive to zero-emissions motoring with more than 10,000 electric cars gliding around the UK capital, accounting for 20% of all its miles covered there and making it the American ride-hailing firm’s top city for EVs.
The news may come as a surprise to those who, after the sudden demise in 2022 of Uber’s planned electric ride-hailing car as partner firm Arrival struck financial trouble, assumed its decarbonisation plans had taken a back seat.
Add in the UK government’s decision to delay the ban on sales of new ICE cars by five years, from 2030 to 2035, and they might have believed the pressure was well and truly off.
In fact, a hostage to its well-publicised commitment to be 100% electric in London by the end of 2025, Uber is part-way through installing 700 EV chargers across Brent, Newham and Redbridge (the wealthier boroughs are already better provided, it says), and this programme is due to gather pace in 2024.
Meanwhile, Uber’s Clean Air Fund has generated £145 million in revenue that it uses to incentivise drivers to make the switch with EV purchase subsidies worth £700 and an extra 10% in trip revenue.
Other steps include discounted charging with BP Pulse and purchase discounts worth around 20% on new EVs from manufacturers including Hyundai, Kia and MG.
With the pressure on all manufacturers to comply with the UK government’s new zero-emission vehicle mandate from this year, that discount might soon start to look quite modest.
Perhaps the biggest
incentive for Uber drivers to go electric comes not from the firm itself but from City Hall, which doesn’t impose its congestion charge on EVs, saving them £15 per day, and (along with newer ICE and hybrid cars) exempts them from the £12.50 Ultra Low Emission Zone fee.
That’s the carrot; the stick is new rules requiring private hire vehicles to be zero-emissions-capable from 2023, or just one step away from being fully electric.
Black cab drivers have taken the hint, with the first already signed up to be Uber drivers under the firm’s recently launched partnership scheme with them. Given that cabbies have historically fiercely opposed Uber, that’s a big turnaround.
According to Uber, drivers who have gone electric say they are saving money not on
