Japanese firm has found that rural EV registrations are high in the UK, where access to petrol stations is limited. Motorists in rural areas are challenging the stereotype that electric car buyers are confined to cities.

That’s according to research by Honda UK, which found that there are electric car hotspots in rural communities where buyers don’t necessarily have easy access to petrol stations.

At the launch of the Honda e – a small electric vehicle targeted at inner-city buyers – the firm’s UK division said buying habits were challenging established views.

Phil Webb, head of car for Honda UK, told the PA news agency that the research had raised the question: “Why is there an intense number of electric vehicle registrations in rural areas, particularly Cornwall and the north of Scotland?”

He explained that one visit to a dealer in Scotland proved particularly eye-opening, saying: “He’s a dealer in a village and there’s not a lot else there. He was telling me that people are going down the electric route because their nearest petrol station is 15 – 20 miles away, but all they want to do is pop to the shops or take the kids to school, so in an electric car, for them, it’s self-sustaining.

“They’re in control of when they charge it – overnight for example – and no longer have that inconvenience of having to go out of their way to a petrol station.

At least a quarter of local authorities in England and Wales have put a brake on the expansion of charging networks for electric vehicles.

More than 100 local councils say they have no plans to increase the number of charging points they offer. Campaigners and politicians fear this could hinder the expansion of the UK’s electric fleet.

Electric vehicles are seen as key to government plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and also have a role in cutting air pollution. This week Public Health England called for vastly more electric vehicles to replace petrol and diesel types, to tackle the problem of toxic air in cities.

The findings come from freedom of information requests submitted by the Liberal Democrats, and were shared with the Guardian. They follow more than a decade of efforts to upgrade the UK’s infrastructure to encourage drivers to switch to electric.

Electric cars could cut the UK’s oil imports by 40% and reduce drivers’ fuel bills by £13bn if deployed on a large scale, according to a new study.

An electric vehicle surge would deliver an average £1,000 of fuel savings a year per driver, and spark a 47% drop in carbon emissions by 2030, said the Cambridge Econometrics study.

The paper, commissioned by the European Climate Foundation, said that air pollutants such as nitrogen oxide and particulates would be all but eliminated by mid-century, with knock-on health benefits from reduced respiratory diseases valued at over £1bn.

But enjoying the fruits of a clean vehicle boom will require an infrastructure roll-out soon, as the analysis assumes a deployment of over 6m electric vehicles by 2030 – growing to 23m by 2050 – powered by ambitious amounts of renewable energy.