LAMPPOSTS in Blaenau Gwent could double up as electric vehicle (EV) charging points soon.

At a meeting of Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council’s Cabinet on Wednesday, June 7, councillors were told that the lamppost charging option was being explored as an option.

At the meeting councillors discussed the Finance and Performance report for 2022/2023, which notes the achievements and problems of the past year and looks ahead to the future.

Cabinet member for regeneration, Cllr John Morgan told councillors that the county borough now has 73 EV charging points installed in 35 sites and that further investment is on the horizon.

Cllr Morgan said: “Another 12 sites are due to be fitted with electric charge points during the next 12 weeks, plus the authority is bidding (for funding) for another 11 sites, which we are hoping to hear about in the not-too-distant future.”

Cabinet member for education, Cllr Sue Edmunds said: “It’s lovely to see all the charge points going in but we’ve got a lot of houses without driveways, is there any movement yet on a way to provide charging points for those houses?”

Director of regeneration and community, Ellie Fry told councillors that the council are “looking at options” but waiting to see how the technology fares in other parts of the UK.

Ms Fry said: “We can look at the pitfalls and the opportunities at the same time.

“There are options where you can have an EV charger fitted to a lamppost and that takes the cable to the car.

“We want to understand how they are working to others and then we’ll start bringing them in to Blaenau Gwent.”

Cllr Morgan said: “The lamppost one is an interesting concept – it’s been happening in the London area, and we’ve been discussing it with the providers.”

Earlier in the meeting, Cllr Haydn Trollope, cabinet member for social services, said that the council’s meals on wheels service would now be provided by staff using electric vehicles.

Cllr Trollope said: “We have acquired four electric vehicles for our meals on wheels programme – we’re hoping to roll it out in the next month.”

He added that the council had worked with a school to design a logo which would be printed and put on the vehicles.

Cllr Trollope said: “We’ll show the borough that we are leading by example and our meals on wheels vans will be electric.

“It’s important that we show that we’re not just paying lip service we feel this is the way forward.”

He added that the initiative would be launched in July.

Councillors approved the report which had been discussed at a scrutiny meeting back in April.