Mobility and electric vehicles

• The UK car industry manufactures a significant proportion of Europe’s electric vehicles, including the Nissan Leaf, one of the most popular models in the world. 
• The UK is where the world comes to innovate, with 7 out of 10 F1 teams having a UK base, and is the home of Formula E and Extreme E.
• The UK excels in the technologies for zero-carbon propulsion (the lithium-ion battery was invented at Oxford University), lightweight materials and structures, and connected and autonomous vehicles.
• To support our goal of achieving Net Zero by 2050, the Prime Minister has announced the 10 Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution in November 2020: 
  • £1.3bn to accelerate the rollout of chargepoints for electric vehicles in homes, streets and on motorways across England, so people can more easily and conveniently charge their cars. 
  • £582m in grants for those buying zero- or ultra-low emission vehicles to make them cheaper to buy and incentivise more people to make the transition.
  • An initial £500m of funding, to be spent in the next four years for the development and industrialisation of electric vehicle supply chains.
• The UK has one of the most flexible regulatory environments in the world for the deployment of automated vehicles:
  • Any level of automation can be trialled on UK roads without a permit providing the vehicle is properly insured, road legal, and overseen by a safety driver.
  • The government committed £200m together with industry to create CAM Testbed UK, a world-leading Connected Automated Vehicle testing ecosystem. It brings together 28 cross-sector partners across six interoperable facilities all within three hours’ drive. No other country is currently organising its testing capabilities in such a collaborative and open fashion.
• In addition, Government has invested £1.2m to help position the UK as a centre for cybersecurity excellence.
• To quickly scale up the hydrogen sector to meet the UK target of 5GW low-carbon hydrogen by 2030, the UK is supporting both blue and green hydrogen production and the development of hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles.
  • With a dynamic hydrogen ecosystem, UK hydrogen companies have world-leading fuel cell, hydrogen production and material technologies, and some have secured substantial foreign direct investment. 66% of UK hydrogen companies surveyed already export goods and services to the growing world hydrogen market.
  • The Department for Transport launched the £23m Hydrogen for Transport Programme in September 2020, which will see the funding of new hydrogen refuse trucks and a hydrogen refuelling station in Glasgow. It has also announced the ambition for Tees Valley to become a trailblazing Hydrogen Transport Hub, bringing together industry and academia to help create hundreds of green jobs.
  • The Net Zero Hydrogen Fund offers £240m to support both blue and green hydrogen production.
  • The UK has a strong pipeline of hydrogen projects across the UK, with Innovate UK funding around 66 H2FC (UK Hydrogen and Fuel Cell) projects, with a total value of £33m.