There will be more public electric car charging stations in the UK than traditional filling stations by the year 2020, according to Nissan.

The car manufacturer noted that the number of filling stations in Britain has fallen drastically since 1970, with only 8,472 nationwide at the end of last year – down from 37,539 stations 46 years ago. Nissan believes the number of UK filling stations will drop below 7,870 by August 2020.

Electric vehicle (EV) charging stations, on the other hand, are expected to number around 7,900 by August 2020.

There are currently more than 4,100 EV charging stations in the UK, with numbers having grown from mere hundreds since 2011.

Edward Jones, EV manager at Nissan, said: 'As electric vehicle sales take off, the charging infrastructure is keeping pace and paving the way for convenient all-electric driving.

'Combine that with constant improvements in our battery performance and we believe the tipping point for mass EV uptake is upon us.'

He believes the EV adoption will follow an 'S-curve' of demand, where a gradual uptake from early adopters accelerates to a groundswell of consumers buying EVs in the same fashion they would purchase any other powertrain.

Go Ultra Low, the joint government and car industry campaign to raise consumer awareness of EVs, recorded that 115 new EVs were registered daily in the first quarter of this year.

The campaign also believes electric power could become the dominant form of propulsion for all new cars in the UK by as early as 2027, with more than 1.3 million electric cars registered each year.