As temperatures rise this summer, thousands of Britons will be taking to the roads and heading to the seaside.
They will spread out across the country to the hundreds of towns and villages stretched along the UK’s beautiful coastline to beaches big and small.
While the majority will be driving conventional petrol and diesel cars, more people than ever will be heading to the coast in electric cars.
A study by Octopus Electric Vehicles has established that a seaside town in Yorkshire, England, is home to the best beach for electric car drivers.
According to Octopus, the best beach is Scarborough Beach in Yorkshire. Around 250 miles from London, 100 miles from Manchester, and 60 miles from Leeds, it has been given an accessibility score of 63 percent.
This has been helped in large part by having over 90 electric vehicle charging points within two miles of the beach and its relative closeness to major cities.
Coming in second behind Scarborough Beach is Cornwall’s Fistral Beach with 27 charging points within two miles and an accessibility score of 62 percent.
In a statement, Octopus said it was the home of British surfing and an array of rapid chargers close to the popular sandy beach.
Making up the podium was Bournemouth Beach in Dorset which had an accessibility score of 55 percent and 22 public chargers within two miles.
As to how they came to crown Scarborough Beach as the number one for electric vehicle drivers, Octopus explained that they used data on the average range of modern electric cars – around 300 miles – plus information on the number of chargers nearby.
Furthermore, they said that each metric was normalised using min-max normalisation to scale them between zero and one. They said that the overall index score was calculated by assigning equal weight to every single metric and then calculating the weighted average.
“The results were then documented and validated to ensure accuracy and consistency in the scoring process.”
The latest study comes as British holidaymakers begin to intensify planning for their summer holidays, during which time temperatures will rise and necessitate the use of air conditioning inside the car.
However, experts have warned using air conditioning in an electric car could reduce its range by as much as 17 percent. As a result, electric car drivers are being urged to keep their batteries topped up to mitigate against the risk of running out.
Head of EV at LV General Insurance and ElectriX Gill Nowell advised: “Most electric car drivers only charge their car once a week or so, and many just ‘top up’ rather than wait until the car is almost out of electrons.
“It’s a good idea to keep your car charged to about 80 per cent, to keep the battery in a good state of health.”
