Dr. Aoife O'Grady:

There actually has been engagement. Louth County Council has very good funding through an EU FASTER programme. We engage with the council through that but because of that, it has not even needed to come to us for funding; it has lots. It is rolling out a cross-Border project, which also involves Scotland, for high-powered charging along both sides of the Border in Ireland and in Scotland. It has been doing very well on that.

There are two steps in terms of local authorities. I think there is a recognition from local authorities, certainly from all the ones to which we have spoken. We have spoken at local authority conferences as well. There is a recognition of the need to step into this space. The questions then are what resources they need to do this job properly, what supports we can give them from central government, on which we are working with them, and what they need to do.

We would look at piloting a number of charging options for people without access to a driveway. Lamp-post charging is running as a pilot in Fingal County Council and Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council. We are looking at what is happening in other cities around Europe. Amsterdam has a nice model whereby people who purchase an EV make the city authority aware of this. If they have access to a driveway, it is not an issue. Really we are talking about people living in towns and cities or in villages with on-street access. The city authority does a scan. If there is an EV charger within 250 m of where people live that is vacant for more than 50% of the time, the authority says that people are fine. That 250 m is built in because it has to be convenient. If there is no EV charger within 250 m, people are prioritised for delivery. If there is a charger within 250 m which is occupied for more than 50% of the time, the authority concludes that there is insufficient infrastructure and maps it.

We are working with local authorities. Through the infrastructure strategy, we have proposed setting up a public sector delivery group which would involve them. It is about working out the right way to do this. Some local authorities do not want to put in on-street charging on streets because they also want to put in active travel routes beside the kerb, so that is a challenge. There is the option of charging hubs. Our key aim is to have infrastructure that is convenient to and used by people. If we have infrastructure within 200 m or 300 m of where people live, that is ideal. It does not have to be on-street. A hub is also fine. We will test a mix of different options over the next year or two. We will probably find there are two or three solutions that really work for people in Ireland and roll them out more widely.