Drinking water boss Philip Russell believes his company has just helped launch the vehicle “service station of the future” – and it’s right here in Dundee.
The Clepington Road hub is packed with the latest tech for electric car drivers, combining rapid and ultra rapid charging, free purified rain water, clever use of used car batteries and better disabled access.
Philip is the managing director of global water business Bluewater. He said: “This is a global first, so it’s really exciting for us.
“This whole site is a real showcase in terms of the art of the possible for sustainability, accessibility and inclusivity.”
In the hub, drivers can charge their electric vehicles (EVs) and fill up their water bottles with purified rainwater.
A total of five chargers are available to the public, four rapid (50kW) and one ultra-rapid (150kW).
Solar panels on a canopy above power these charging points, plus the lithium batteries in the battery storage units are taken from old vehicles, in another nod to sustainability.
Philip said the hub mixes “zero emission mobility with zero single-use plastic hydration.
“The vision here is to provide clean, purified sustainable drinking water to all users and visitors to the site.”
Bluewater has worked on projects worldwide, including providing purified local water at the 150th Open in St Andrews and in Egypt during COP27.
At the Dundee hub, the rainwater is collected in the gutters from the solar canopy, then it goes into a tank below the ground where it is cleansed.
It is then delivered to the two filling stations and straight into your bottles perfectly purified.
They also have back-up access to the municipal water supply so the units can still provide water if there isn’t enough rain.
The vision of Bluewater and Dundee City Council is for both the people and cars to refuel in an eco-friendly way.
“The petrol station of history is full of single-use plastics,” Philip continued, “everything is in a single-use plastic bottle.
“The obvious other problem is the petrol and diesel [which are] polluting.
“We’ve conceived it as building the service station of the future.
“It shouldn’t just be free of internal combustion [engine] vehicles, it should also be free of single-use plastics for human hydration.”
New Dundee charging hub accessible for all
This is the fourth EV charging hub for the city, in addition to multi-storey hubs based in the Olympia and Greenmarket, and their Princes Street hub.
Another priority for the creators of the charging hub was to make it accessible for all users, including people with disabilities.
Helen Dolphin MBE is a disability expert that worked alongside Dundee transport consultants Urban Foresight to make the charging hub as accessible as possible for disabled people.
Helen lost both her hands and legs to meningitis at the age of 22.
She said that disabled people struggle immensely when faced with a typical fuel station.
Helen spoke of having to give her pin number to the cashier behind the till when trying to pay for her fuel, because she couldn’t reach the card machine from her wheelchair. It was either that or taking out a large amount of cash.
Before contactless payments, Helen said, this was a typical situation for many disabled people.
Filling up with the fuel wasn’t plain sailing either, and although there is a “help” button on most fuel pumps, Helen said most garage staff rarely knew this function existed.
Eye-opening trials for accessible EV charging
Now, Helen has a hybrid car.
Thanks to the work she did with the Urban Foresight team, Helen and other disabled drivers will have unimpeded access to chargers at Dundee’s new charging hub.
“The work I did with Urban Foresight was a bit of an eye-opener for me,” she said.
“We did a lot of testing but they have come up with a really good charger that I was able to use.
“This is the first time since becoming a disabled person that I don’t have to rely on another human being to re-fuel my vehicle for me. It was a bit of a eureka moment.”
Helen is now considering going fully electric in the future.
Each of the charging bays at the hub are widened, which improves accessibility for disabled people. There is also a significant amount of hatching space between each charger.
There are no bollards, kerbs or plinths so there is a level access to the charge points.
The chargers themselves also work with a pulley system, so they aren’t too heavy to hold.
The chargers themselves are of course eco-friendly too, with the solar panels for sourcing energy and recycled batteries in the storage units.
The location of the hub will also help reduce emissions on the A90.
Mark Flynn, convenor of the Dundee Council’s city development committee, said: “We have put [the Dundee charging hubs] in strategic points. This one especially is quite good because it’s close to the A90.
“It’s important that we have something close to the main artery for the country.
“People can come off [the A90] and charge up with rapid chargers – get some water as well – sit down and have a relax for twenty minutes and get back on the road again.
“This is the point of the infrastructure, not just for the city, but for the country.”
Conversation