Ministers should consider subsidising e-bikes as they do electric cars, campaigners have urged, after a study found that mass use of such bikes could create more than £2bn in health benefits and cut a million tonnes of emissions annually.
While grants of up to £1,500 are available for low-emission cars, vans and motorbikes, there is no such assistance for electric-assist bikes, which help propel riders up to a maximum powered speed of 15mph when the bike is being pedalled.
According to an evidence review by academics at Westminster University, commissioned by the campaign group Bike is Best, boosting e-bike use would bring other benefits not created by electric cars, including reduced road congestion and fewer potentially dangerous particulates from tyre and brake wear.
E-bikes have become increasingly common in the UK, but sales are still well below levels seen in many other European countries, where studies have shown they are particularly popular with older riders and with women.
The study included polling that shows 67% of Britons who might be interested in buying an e-bike are put off by the price. But of these, the poll said, 53% would be likely to buy one if there was a hypothetical subsidy of £250 on a £1,000 model.
The study used the Department for Transport’s so-called propensity to cycle tool, based on detailed data about work trips and used to inform decisions on cycling schemes, to calculate that mass bike infrastructure and access to e-bikes could prompt up to 25% of commuting trips to be made by bike.
Such a switch would produce overall economic health benefits in England and Wales of £2.2bn a year, most of this coming from better health due to e-bike use, but also because of lower levels of staff absence through illness.
While e-bikes provide less of a health benefit per mile than unpowered bikes, studies have shown that users tend to end up with similar overall levels of physical activity because e-bike riders travel longer distances on average.
The latest study found that promoting e-bike use would mean a particular rise among people who live in more rural or hilly areas.
Both the £2.2bn health dividend and the estimated saving of a million tonnes a year in carbon emissions are based just on commuting, as that is the data on which the propensity to cycle tool is based. The overall savings could thus be significantly greater, the authors said. The statistics are for England and Wales only, as they are the source of the propensity to cycle data.
While fully electric cars produce no carbon emissions while in motion, the million-tonne saving was calculated from the lower power requirement to recharge an e-bike – studies have put this at 2% of what is needed for an electric car – and substantially lower emissions associated with their construction.
As well as commuting, the study notes, the development of e-cargo bikes could create even more emissions reductions through urban freight use, a significant contributor to road transport emissions. Studies have suggested e-cargo bikes could replace up to a quarter of all so-called last mile deliveries currently done using vans. Consumer models can be used to carry children and heavy shopping.
Scott Purchas, of Bike is Best, said the UK risked lagging behind other European countries on e-bike use. “The future is electric but not in the way people might think. All of the focus for subsidies has been for electric cars, but this new report demonstrates the substantial benefits of electric bikes and how essential they are for rapidly decarbonising transport, improving our health and cleaning up the air at the same time,” he said.
A Department for Transport spokesperson said the government was investing £2bn in cycling and walking, and that e-bikes for commuting were already subsidised under the tax-saving Cycle to Work scheme.
