ELECTRIC car technology is advancing all the time, and yet the latest figures suggest that Taunton Deane is not on board the green vehicle revolution.

Despite manufacturers lowering prices and increasing the range of their cars, over the 2017-18 financial year, there were only 38 new electric vehicles registered in the area.

That's far below the 2,401 in Peterborough, which had the highest increase of plug-in vehicles of any local authority in the United Kingdom. Bristol had the biggest drop, with 236 electric cars being taken off the roads.

The figures come from recently released Department for Transport data, which shows the number of registered electric or plug-in hybrid cars, vans and micro cars called quadricycles in Taunton Deane over the four quarters of the year.

From January to March 2017 there were 132 electric vehicles.

By March this year there were 170.

This is low compared with the rest of the UK, and goes against the increased accessibility and practicality of electric cars in recent years.

The latest Nissan Leaf, the United Kingdom's most popular entirely electric car, can now travel 235 miles before it needs to be recharged, 80 miles more than the previous version.

Last month BP announced it would follow Shell and install charging points at its petrol stations and Dyson has also said it plans to release an electric car by 2020.

One advantage electric car users have over other vehicles is that they do not have to pay road tax, as they do not release any emissions.

Electricity is also far cheaper than petrol and diesel, and green drivers have the satisfaction of helping save the planet.

Unsurprisingly plug-in vehicles still make up a tiny percentage of the cars on the road in Taunton Deane.

Compared with the 170 electric cars on our roads, there are 71,724 cars and vans in total, according to the latest complete vehicle registration data from 2017.