The electrification of vehicles has the potential to significantly reduce carbon emissions. Transport accounts for a significant component of global greenhouse gas emissions (see this section for more details). Whilst electric vehicles are not emission free (the electricity required to charge batteries involves the production of emissions), the electricity produced in centralised power stations involves less greenhouse gas emissions than would otherwise be emitted by using petrol in internal combustion engines.
There are likely to be other environmental benefits from a large electric vehicle fleet. A distributed pool of vehicle batteries can be used by the grid as electricity storage when such batteries are not being used by vehicles. This pool can be used to supply electricity during periods of peak demand, or to provide services to the grid such as frequency management. This increases the efficiency of the grid and would reduce the requirement for 'peaking' generation, which is typically highly greenhouse gas emission intensive oil generation.
A large network of charging points is in the process of being developed, and requires further development, to support the growth of electric vehicles. A map of UK based charging points can be found at Zap Map
