Infrastructure Delivery Plan (Feb 2013) - Runnymede Borough Council

demonstrators or in very low volumes. Due to vehicle development lead times, mass
production and volume availability of EVs and PHEVs is unlikely to occur before 2014
at the earliest.
8.9 The impact of EVs and PHEVs on the UK electricity grid has been examined in the
‘Investigation into the Scope for the Transport Sector to Switch to Electric Vehicles and
Plug-in Hybrid Vehicles’ (October 2008) which was jointly undertaken by Arup and
Cenex on behalf of the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform
(BERR) and the Department for Transport (DfT). This report investigates the scope for
the transport sector to switch to vehicles powered through electricity from the grid in the
period until 2030.
8.10 The report concludes that there is sufficient generating capacity to cope with the uptake
assuming that demand for charging is managed and targeted at off-peak periods where
there is currently surplus capacity. In this same report, it is also stated that the existing
national transmission network will be sufficient to cope with the demand from vehicles.
There may possibly be distribution issues where local networks are already close to
capacity but in such circumstances this can be overcome with local reinforcement.
Costs and funding sources
8.11 It is expected that any additional/upgraded utilities infrastructure required to support
new development over the plan period will be funded by the relevant developers or
energy providers where necessary although no specific improvements to the existing
gas and electricity networks have been identified at this time.
Risk Assessment
8.12 No identified risk to this receptor at this time.
Conclusion
8.13 Overall the existing infrastructure is considered to be sufficient to support the
development proposed over the plan period without large scale improvements. It is
envisaged that any improvements required to the existing network would be small scale
and funded by the relevant developers or energy providers where necessary.
Mobile communications
Existing provision
8.14 There are a number of telecommunications masts within the Borough which are
generally well spread. These installations serve not only residents and businesses
within the Borough, but also people passing through the Borough on a daily basis.
8.15 Since April 2000, when Vodafone and Telefónica were successful in their bids for two
of the five licences available to provide a ‘Third Generation’ mobile telecommunications
service known as ‘3G’, these companies have been under a legal obligation to expand
their networks to provide 3G coverage to an area where at least 80% of the UK
population live by 2007. Applications for new telecommunications equipment to provide
3G coverage to certain areas of the Borough have however been received beyond
2007.
8.16 In addition, the UK Government has an ambition for the country to have the best
superfast broadband network in the EU by 2015 (BT openreach website). BT
openreach have been rolling out a series of new cabinets within each of their telephone
exchange areas that will be used to provide these high speed broadband services to
residents and businesses in the exchange areas. This service is known as ‘Super Fast
Fibre Access’ (SFFA) and will provide up to 40Mb per second download speeds and up
to 10Mb upload speeds. It is estimated that around two-thirds of UK premises will
benefit from this service by the end of 2014.
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Runnymede IDP DRAFT – February 2013