The 500km problem: why NZ Police hasn’t gone electric on the frontline

New Zealand Police runs hybrids, plug-in hybrids and full EVs across its fleet, but don’t expect an electric frontline patrol car any time soon. The sticking point is a single number: 500km.

Speaking to our sister outlet NZ Autocar after the unveiling of the new-generation Skoda Superb patrol car, Police acting national fleet manager Leighton Hamlin says every frontline vehicle must be able to cover a planning range of around 500km per shift, and that remains the barrier to battery power on general duties.

“If we’re doing 500Ks per shift, we need to make sure that we can do that and we’re not spending two hours juicing up,” Hamlin says. “People probably want us out there doing policing.”

That doesn’t mean EVs are locked out of police work entirely. Police began trialling five BMW i4s with highway patrol in 2023, and three years on the electric BMWs have earned a permanent spot.

“We’ve still got the five in the fleet thankfully, and going well, going great,” Hamlin says. “The key is the application of them. Where we have them now is with highway patrol and their shifts are a bit more structured, so it works quite well for them to be able to charge the vehicle, do the shift, recharge the vehicle and continue on.”

He’s a fan of the car itself too. “They’re just a great high-performance vehicle. They seem to pull people over with relative ease.”

The electric footprint extends beyond the frontline. Police also run Hyundai Kona and Ioniq 5 EVs in non-frontline roles, and have trialled the plug-in hybrid version of the Skoda Superb.

Electric contenders were in the mix when police went back to market at the end of the previous Skoda contract, with BYD among the brands putting vehicles forward alongside Toyota and BMW. The Tesla Model Y, a popular suggestion when NZ Autocar asked readers what police should be driving, gets a more practical rejection than most would expect. “Pretty cool. Super fast car. Glass roof though, bit hard for antennas,” Hamlin says.

In the meantime, Hamlin says police are still pushing on electrification, with hybrids spread widely through the fleet of roughly 4000 vehicles. The petrol-powered Superb carries on as the frontline workhorse, with the first 19 new-generation cars heading out for a two-to-three-month evaluation before the wider rollout. But with highway patrol proving the electric case in the right role, the question looks increasingly like when rather than whether.

Watch the full interview on the NZ Autocar YouTube channel.