What if you were mayor for the day and you had to inspire people to drive electric? That was one of the key moments of the first panel at the Plug It In Summit, when Ross Lydall challenged his panellists to solve one of the biggest problems of emobility today: getting the majority of people who say they would drive an electric car to join the mere 1.5 percent who already do.
Dierdre Costigan, Vice Chair of London’s Transport and Environment Committee; Lauren Pamma from the Green Finance Institute; Andrew Brem, Uber UK’s General Manager; and Toddington Harper, CEO of Gridserve, debated the value of different strategies that might get people into these world-changing vehicles.
Is the answer more chargepoints, more financial incentives, a broader second-hand sales market - or is it simply getting more people to test drive an EV and discover a whole new and better way of driving?