Royal Dutch Shell wants to install 50,000 on-street electric vehicle chargers in the UK over the next four years.
The move could give the energy group a third of the public charging market by 2025. It is separately rolling out charging points on petrol station forecourts and at other locations such as supermarkets.
Shell is planning the rapid expansion through its charging infrastructure business, Ubitricity, acquired in February. It installs EV charging points in street furniture such as lamp posts or bollards.
The company said it hoped to drive uptake of on-street chargers by offering local authorities help to finance the installations “at potentially zero cost”.
A government scheme designed to encourage their roll-out by councils already offers to meet 75% of the cost of installation, but they have to finance the remaining 25% and have been slow to sign up.
The Competition and Markets Authority warned in a report in July that the roll-out of on-street public chargers has been “slow and is very patchy”.
