The Guardian view on EV charging: China took the right lessons from Britain’s past | Editorial
TThe future of electric cars arrived this week in China. The world’s largest car seller, BYD, has revealed a new battery giving its latest electric models more than 600 miles of range. Remarkably, the Chinese automaker said a range of 250 miles could be injected into its new batteries in just five minutes. If this is true, the remaining advantages of gasoline cars – long range and quick refueling – begin to disappear.
But such technology requires megawatt charging points. A single charger can use as much energy as a small town in Britain. BYD’s system relies on chargers delivering around 1.5 megawatts of electricity, more than four times the fastest chargers in the UK. China is moving quickly and plans to build thousands of megawatt charging stations within two years.
Britain, on the other hand, would today struggle to support such a network. Without upgrading substations and local networks, the system would not be able to handle the power peaks created by ultra-fast charging of electric vehicles. This country’s electricity responsibilities are divided among many organizations and companies. Improvements are slow and difficult, especially when compared to Chinese state-led network investments. The Chinese model in some ways resembles the post-war British electricity system.
Under the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB), as economic historian Arthur Downing points out, generation, transmission, and system operation were integrated into a single organization that planned the network. Large power plants were linked by a national grid and operated as a single system, providing decades of efficiency gains and lower electricity prices.
Electricity abundance in Britain did not arise because the state withdrew. It emerged because the state created institutions capable of coordinating a complex industry. Britain has built its first national electricity grid in seven years. Today, some transport projects require double that just to get planning approval and connect to the grid. Building the infrastructure needed to transition to a low-carbon economy requires institutional capacity – not just deregulation.
Considered a relic by Margaret Thatcher, the CEGB was dismantled and privatized in 1989. Labor warned that prices would rise. They did it. The “privatisation premium”, according to analysis by think tank Common Wealth, now sees almost a quarter of the average household energy bill – around £450 – invested in company profits. Other essential services are also affected. In the English privatized system, almost 30% of the water bill is intended for shareholder income and debt payment. In contrast, state-owned Scottish Water spends 10% of its revenue on borrowing costs.
These costs do not primarily relate to the price of pipes, power plants or networks. They reflect financing and ownership. Utilities borrowed at a rate close to the government rate. Private companies must also reward their shareholders, by increasing the cost of capital which is reflected in household bills. Over 30 to 40 years, the cost difference is in the billions.
Privatization has fragmented the UK electricity system, replacing integrated planning by businesses, regulators and markets. However, infrastructure networks depend on the knowledge acquired over decades by laboratory engineers and operators. When these institutions disappear, much of that capacity disappears with them. Britain now faces a choice: rebuild the network’s coordination capacity – or see technologies like BYD’s arrive elsewhere.
