Exploring the feasibility of electric vehicle travel for remote communities in Australia

ABSTRACT

Remote communities in Australia face unique mobility challenges that may be further complicated by the transition from Internal Combustion Engine vehicles to Electric Vehicles (EVs). EVs offer numerous advantages including lower maintenance requirements and independence from costly, dangerous and polluting petroleum imports. Yet the adoption of EVs in Australia has been slow by international standards, and what policiesdo exist tend to focus on incentivising uptake among urban residents with the means to afford new technologies, potentially leaving remote communities in the ‘too hard basket’. In this study, we assess the feasibility of EVs for communities in remote Australia using Geographic Information System analysis of travel distances between communities and service hub towns utilising present-day EV specifications and charging technologies. We show that, while EV travel is often not currently feasible for trips to large service hub towns using low-range vehicles, over 99% of communities and residents would be able to travel to their nearest small service hub town with existing long-range EVs. This suggests that while the barriers to the electrification of transport in remote communities are significant, they are not insurmountable and are deserving of consideration in national and state policy developments in the deployment of charging infrastructure.

KEYWORDS:

• Electric vehicles
• range anxiety
• electric vehicle charging
• hub and spoke model
• remote communities
• geographic information system
• transport policy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Vehicle ranges accurate at time of citation (August 2020). Vehicle ranges expressed in All Electric Range WLTP.

2 Onboard Charger capacity in Table 2 caps the amount of DC power receivable by the EV when attempting to charge with AC power from the grid or any other standalone system [56].

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Keigan Demaria

Keigan Demaria earned his Honours in the School of Engineering at the Australian National University.

Björn C. P. Sturmberg

Björn C. P. Sturmberg is a Research Leader in the Battery Storage and Grid Integration Program at the Australian National University where he conducts transdisciplinary work to accelerate the transition to decarbonised energy and transport systems.

Brad Riley

Brad Riley is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research at the Australian National University working on First Nations benefit in the energy transition as part of the Zero Carbon Energy for the Asia Pacific Grand Challenge.

Francis Markham

Francis Markham is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research at the Australian National University. His research aims to integrate critical geographic theory with quantitative methods, in particular the social applications of Geographic Information Systems.