UK based supermarket, Sainsbury’s has now hit an impressive milestone for EV charging bays. The supermarket operates the Smart Charge network throughout the country and has made impressive progress in the short time it has been operating. Sainsbury's only started the Smart Charge network over a year ago and has already hit the 500 charging bay milestone. The supermarket has basically been opening a new site at a rate of one per week, with 62 locations already installed.

The 500th EV charging bay was opened a few weeks ago at its Tamworth store in Staffordshire. Each hub has up to 18 individual bays, with fast DC chargers, up to 150kW. The vast majority of which are CCS2 with at least one, at this stage being CHAdeMO. CHAdeMO is a legacy standard and was used on the Nissan Leaf and older hybrid models and is, in 2024 considered somewhat obsolete.

“Today we’ve reached another fantastic milestone in the rollout of Smart Charge with the launch of our 500th charging bay. We know that a lack of readily available public charging points and long wait times to use existing services can be barriers to EV adoption in the UK, and we’re on a mission to improve this wherever we can. With ultra-rapid charging points in more locations than ever before, we’re focused on expanding our Smart Charge Network in key areas up and down the country where we know the demand is highest.”

Patrick Dunne - Director of Property, Procurement & EV Ventures, Sainsbury’s

Sainsbury’s has around 1,431 locations in the UK, with 834 of them being smaller convenience stores. That means though, that 597 of them are likely able to have EV chargers installed. At present, Sainsbury’s has not specified how many locations it plans on expanding Smart Charge too, but it is making good progress nonetheless.

Sainsbury’s also owns Nectar and EV drivers can benefit from collecting Nectar points when using Smart Charge. Sainsbury’s doesn't use any apps, but a QR code can be scanned in order to add the points. Payment is taken via contactless payment and is currently 75p/kWh.

Image Credit: Sainsbury's