Electric vehicle charging provision by dwelling count

The electric vehicle charging requirement for dwellings is set by building regulations rather than by planning policy, and the count that matters is the number of parking spaces associated with the dwellings rather than the number of homes. Approved Document S requires a new dwelling with an associated parking space to have a charge point. Where a residential building has more than ten dwellings with associated parking, each dwelling with a space gets a charge point and every remaining space gets cable routes for a future one.

Planning officers still ask about charging at application stage, and local policy in some areas goes further than the national minimum. The two systems overlap, so a developer answering only one of them tends to get asked twice.

What the Building Regulations now require

Approved Document S covers infrastructure for charging electric vehicles and applies to new dwellings, to buildings undergoing major renovation and to residential and mixed use buildings with parking. The core provision for a new home is a charge point with a minimum power output of 7 kW, untethered, capable of charging from a socket compatible with the relevant standard.

The practical reading for a developer is in three parts. A house with its own drive or garage gets a charge point. A block with associated parking gets a charge point per dwelling where the space count allows, plus cable routes elsewhere. And a scheme with no associated parking at all triggers no requirement, which is why car free schemes in city centres appear to escape the obligation.

Load management is permitted, so the electrical design does not have to assume every charge point drawing full power simultaneously. That matters for the connection capacity you request from the distribution network operator.

Dwellings with and without associated parking

A space is associated with a dwelling where it is within the site and intended for that dwelling's use. Unallocated spaces in a communal car park serving a block are associated with the building rather than with any single home, which changes the provision.

Read the Approved Document itself for the precise wording before relying on the table, because the exemptions and the treatment of mixed use buildings carry detail that a summary cannot hold.

Communal parking and the cable route requirement

Cable routes are the quiet cost. A cable route means the containment, ducting and space in the electrical infrastructure needed so a charge point can be installed later without rebuilding the car park. In an undercroft or basement that means trays, risers and a distribution board with spare ways.

Three things go wrong. The ducts are drawn but the switchroom has no spare capacity, so the route leads nowhere. The route is laid to the space but no provision is made for metering an individual dwelling's consumption. Or the car park is resurfaced over ducts whose ends nobody recorded.

Record the route on an as built drawing and leave draw cords in the ducts. A management company adding charge points three years later will pay for the absence of both.

Where local policy goes further

Planning policy can and does exceed the building regulations minimum. In London the London Plan sets expectations for active and passive provision in residential and commercial parking, and borough policies add their own requirements. Elsewhere, adopted local plans and parking standards supplementary documents set percentages of active provision, requirements for rapid charging in visitor parking, and in some cases provision for car clubs.

Check three documents at the outset: the adopted local plan, the authority's parking standards, and any climate or sustainable transport supplementary planning document. Where a policy requires more than the regulations, the policy governs the application, and a condition will secure it.

The useful move is to show provision on the submitted drawings so it becomes part of the approved scheme rather than an afterthought in a condition. That evidence belongs with the transport material, which for larger schemes is the Transport Assessment and for smaller ones a short statement, with the behavioural measures in the Travel Plan.

Electrical capacity as the real constraint

The requirement is easy to draw and harder to energise. A scheme of 40 flats with 40 cable routes and 20 charge points implies a connection capacity far above what the same block would have needed a decade ago, and the distribution network operator's quotation reflects whatever reinforcement the local network needs.

Ask the operator early, with a load schedule that states the charge point provision and the load management strategy. Where the answer involves a new substation, that affects the site layout and the programme, which is exactly the sort of interaction a Utilities Assessment is meant to surface before the layout is fixed.

Heat pumps compound it. A scheme with electric heating, electric cooking and charge points has a very different maximum demand from one with gas boilers, and the diversity assumptions used by the designer should be stated rather than assumed.

Future proofing provision

Spare capacity in the incoming supply, spare ways in the distribution board, and oversized containment cost very little at construction and a great deal afterwards. On a scheme that will be managed by a residents' company, the specification should anticipate charge points being added individually over several years rather than all at once.

Decide the metering arrangement at design stage. Charging from a landlord's supply with recharging through service charges creates administrative work and disputes. A dedicated circuit from each dwelling's own supply avoids that, but it needs the containment route from the flat to the space, which is the thing that cannot be retrofitted at low cost.

Where provision is phased across a larger site, keep the phasing honest. Splitting a scheme to avoid a threshold is a familiar temptation, and the position on phasing a large scheme without gaming thresholds applies to charging provision as much as to anything else.

Showing provision on the drawings

Mark on the site layout, for each space: whether it is allocated, whether a charge point is installed, whether a cable route is provided, and the position of the unit or the duct termination. Add a note stating the power output and that load management is used where it is.

On a block, add a services route drawing showing containment from the switchroom to the parking level, and a schedule listing spaces, dwellings and provision type. Officers and building control both read that schedule, and it answers a planning condition and a regulations check with one document.

Energy and carbon reporting sits separately, since charge points are not a regulated emissions measure, though the two documents are often read together and the position on energy and carbon requirements by scheme scale sets out where each belongs.

This is general guidance, not legal advice. Approved Document S and local policy are both revised periodically, so check the current edition of the Approved Document and the adopted local policy with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

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