Ms Suzanne Ward:

The Dingle Project is run by ESB Networks. The people who ran it will come into the committee, if required, to talk about that project in detail. I can outline some of the information that came out of it. It was found that drivers, on average, drive a distance of only 80 km. Dr. O'Grady talked about certain perceptions people have at this time. For instance, most people feel they would need to charge their cars on a more regular basis than is the case. The Dingle Project showed that, on average, drivers are only travelling distances of approximately 80 km and that is in rural areas where people use their car a lot more often than do drivers elsewhere. That type of insight will help us to deal with the perception issue.

The other issue was that people were really willing to embrace the technology of EVs and EV charging and to make changes very quickly. When people got comfortable with the technology, how the car operated and so on, that helped massively. There are a lot of perceptions out there. One can now charge a car for 400 km at the night rate for less than €10. When that is compared with current fuel costs, it will help to speed up the evolution of EVs on the road.

I will hand over to my colleague, Mr. Byrne, to comment on the criteria for charging locations.