London Gatwick has become the first international airport to open an Electric Forecourt®, a dedicated electric vehicle (EV) charging station, with the new GRIDSERVE facility available for all to use from today. The brand-new site has 30 high-power and low-power electric vehicle chargers available via contactless payment - ideal for passengers, staff, local residents, commuters, or business fleets - alongside high-speed Wi-Fi, a lounge area, Costa Coffee, Little Fresh convenience store and an interactive EV experience area. Here is London Gatwick development director Bronwen Jones
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00:00 Good morning, my name is Bronwyn Jones. I'm the Development Director for Gatwick Airport.
00:03 We are so proud to be working with GridServe. It's a fantastic game-changing moment
00:12 I think for the whole village that is Gatwick. We have people traveling into the airport, people traveling out of the airport,
00:18 we have staff coming in and out, we have local residents.
00:20 It's such a strategic point to be able to have a genuinely different way of thinking about how we power our vehicles.
00:27 And convenient as well as being strategic, it's just convenient for the local community as well as passengers coming to the airport and staff.
00:34 Absolutely, we're just off the M23, we're just off the A23, it's easy to get in, it's easy to get out.
00:41 What could be more straightforward?
00:55 So for Gatwick ourselves, one of the things we've got to do is decarbonize our vehicle fleet.
01:01 We've got 350 odd vehicles at the airport, we need to work our way through all of those by 2030 and transition them.
01:09 And knowing that we've got a means to power them is really, really important.
01:13 We're going to be doing our own work as well, but this gives that anchor point.
01:17 One of our commitments is we want to make sure that 60% of people traveling to the airport are doing so in a zero or ultra-low fashion.
01:27 Again, this gives people confidence that they can bring their electric vehicle to the airport and they will always be powered here, 24/7.
01:33 And can you see this expanding more full course within the Gatwick area?
01:37 Well, when you think about the petrol alternatives, there are at least two, one in North Terminal, one in South Terminal.
01:44 So why wouldn't we see that expand as the demand grows?
01:48 And I know it's already been busy, the first few days that this has been open, so it's really going to be exciting to see how quickly we can build that momentum here.
01:56 And the actual facility here as well, we've been shown around and we've gone to the shop where you just tap your card, go and pick anything up.
02:01 I know.
02:02 It's amazing, isn't it?
02:03 It's really amazing.
02:04 And I think, you know, GridServe's mission is to make it a very different experience from buying petrol and diesel.
02:10 I think we all think of it as it needs to be as good as, but actually they're trying to make it better.
02:15 And this is a very, very different experience and something that I think is genuinely game changing.