On Tuesday the White House unveiled the latest stage of its $7.5 billion national EV charging network, by opening applications to fund electric vehicle charging in local communities and highways nationwide—a key step towards the administration’s goal of building a national network of 500,000 public EV charging stations by the year 2030.
The program, part of the bipartisan infrastructure legislation signed into law last year, was well received by the transportation industry and analysts, but more may be needed to really make a difference.
“I think the federal government must play a role in building this infrastructure, at least providing the incentive,” said Charge Enterprises (CRGE) CEO Andrew Fox in an interview with Yahoo Finance. (Video above) “This incentive and program by the administration I think is a welcome relief, but I think there's going to be a lot more to come in the coming years because this is a vast undertaking.”
Fox added: “I don't think people realize just how much of this infrastructure needs to be built today, in order to see the evolution of this clean tech on the roads.”
The Administration is actively reaching out to public and private companies to help with the buildout, offering financial incentives among other things to get the ball rolling. Charging companies like Electrify America, ChargePoint and EVgo are working with automakers like GM (GM), Mercedes (MBG.DE), Volvo and other companies such as Starbucks (SBUX), BP (BP), and TravelCenters (TA) to build out the network.
Then there’s the 800 lb. gorilla in the room - Tesla (TSLA). Tesla’s vast private network of around 17,000 supercharger stations in the U.S., and the company has agreed to open up 7,500 of those stations to non-Tesla charging. Tesla also plans to double its full nationwide network of superchargers, the White House said.
Of course Tesla is not doing this out of charity, there is a big government carrot in the form of capital that federal government will provide. Several locations have now opened up in New York state, and a few in California, though new frictions are arising in the Tesla’s former home state.
According to Tesla enthusiast blog Drive Tesla Canada, Tesla is walking away from $6.4 million in California state money to build 164 Supercharger stations because of conditions the state is imposing.
Tesla’s Supercharger stations work with the Tesla mobile app for charging and payment services. In some instances the app isn’t necessary as the Tesla charger “knows” the Tesla vehicle connecting to it because the car is pre-registered.
California is requiring Tesla to install credit card readers for non-Tesla owners to pay for charging services, as opposed to using the Tesla app. In a statement obtained by Drive Tesla Canada, Tesla’s head of policy and business development said in a letter, “unfortunately, due to unnecessarily cumbersome payment infrastructure requirements, we are unable to utilize this award,” referring to the California incentive.
Requirements like these might throw a wrench in buildout plans if big charging partners balk at standardizing some features.
Still, there’s a huge opportunity for those partners who are willing to work with the government to get the job done. While the administration has a goal of 500,000 chargers by the end of the decade, S&P Mobility said the country will actually need millions more.
“When you look at 2035 numbers— so we have about 4 million electric vehicles on the road today. That number is supposed to 10x by the end of the decade and then almost double by 2035,” Charge’s Fox said. “And so you're talking about an unbelievable opportunity for infrastructure companies, like ours, to provide long-term solutions. And if you're using a baseball game analogy, we're one out in the top half of the first inning. And so it's a really exciting time to be on the infrastructure side.”
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Pras Subramanian is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. You can follow him on Twitter and on Instagram.
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