Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what the expenditure by Network Rail has been on (a) transitioning 25 per cent of its car fleet to ultra-low emissions vehicles and (b) installing electric vehicle charging facilities across 10 per cent of passenger parking bays since 2020; and what estimate her Department has made of the projected capital cost required to transition 100 per cent of Network Rail’s car and van fleet to zero-emissions vehicles.

Network Rail’s ‘Our ambition for a low-emission railway’, published in 2020, committed Network Rail to change 25 per cent of its car fleet to ultra-low emissions vehicles (ULEV) by 2022.

The table below shows the operational expenditure for transitioning 25 per cent of the Network Rail car fleet to ultra-low emissions vehicles. The figures represent the uplift in leasing costs from a traditional internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle to a ULEV model. It is important to note that the uplift in leasing costs is not just due to ULEV vehicles being more expensive than a traditional ICE, but also that they will be newer vehicles so representing inflationary changes in vehicle costs over a number of years.

The 25 per cent target was achieved and ULEVs currently equate to 37 per cent of the Network Rail car fleet.

Network Rail aims to achieve a 100% zero emission fleet. In order to achieve that, investment is needed in charging infrastructure. The data below, broken down according to regional and functional level, shows the capital costs for the associated infrastructure being installed for a full battery-electric vehicle fleet; the figures run only to 2027, starting from 2023.

The total spend so far on installing electric vehicle charging facilities across 10 per cent of passenger parking bays is £19,772,448 (Capex). This has delivered EV charging facilities across 7.8% of the total NR passenger parking bays so far.