Our Shot to Get Vehicle Charging Right

We have arrived at a historic moment in the nation’s journey to the clean transportation future. With a convergence of strong government leadership, rapidly maturing technology and growing private investment, we are at the dawn of the electric vehicle future. This is our chance to build the network of charging stations needed to facilitate this clean transportation.

Now’s the time to do it – and do it right.  To paraphrase Hamilton, we can’t throw away our shot.

President Biden has set ambitious goals for climate action, including for electric vehicle adoption. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act commits $7.5 billion for charging infrastructure and establishes a new Joint departments of Energy and Transportation office to set guidance and standards for grants to get this charging network built. .

This more muscular federal role comes at a time when numerous states and cities have already made great strides in promoting and enabling transportation electrification, utilities are investing billions to support charging infrastructure, and many of the country’s largest corporations have pledged to electrify their fleets. Meanwhile, it seems as if every day the auto and truck manufacturers are rolling out new electric vehicles, with batteries getting stronger and costs getting more competitive.

The stage is set for us to overcome the greatest remaining challenge to mass EV adoption: deploying sufficient charging infrastructure to assure consumers and fleet operators that they can meet all their driving needs when they go electric. 

To meet this historic moment, the administration has to get at least three things right.  First, it must ensure that the resulting charging ecosystem delivers an experience that meets or exceeds what conventional vehicles offer. Second, the federal programs must catalyze private sector investment on a grand scale.  And third, it must learn from experience.

Attach the right strings

Vehicle charging should be consumer friendly, affordable, and accessible, ensuring that drivers are able to roam easily among different charging providers’ systems. The charging ecosystem must meet the needs of cars, trucks and buses and ensure safety, reliability, privacy, cybersecurity, and price transparency.  Within the new federal grant programs, provisions must be made to ensure that there are enough trained electricians and technicians,  standards for communication protocols and cybersecurity. Funding programs must have the right strings attached. 

Tap the capital markets

Public and utility funding must catalyze and complement private sector investment.  Funds from the capital markets are starting to flow into transportation electrification. Now, we need to open the floodgates. That entails creating market signals, promoting competition, enabling financeable business models, and building in flexibility that will kindle innovation.

Public utility commissions across the nation approved more than $3 billion in charging stations, with a third of that amount targeted to low-income and disadvantaged communities. And companies like Volta, Amply, EVgo and Tritium are rolling out new and innovative charging businesses that promise new ways of ensuring a profitable, sustainable network gets built. As just one example, Volta partnered with Southern California Edison to help build out charging in Los Angeles – while providing a communication platform to encourage EV adoption.

Listen to Learn

For many in the charging world, this year has a feel of déjà vu all over again. Vehicle charging got a big boost in the 2009 American Recovery and Investment Act and from the VW Settlement fund. Some things worked; some didn’t. Policymakers need to learn from those experiences. We need policymakers to move quickly, but also intelligently.

We also need to learn from decades of transportation policy, which brought us the interstate highway system but also destroyed many low income and majority minority neighborhoods and disproportionately exposed remaining residents to toxic air pollution. The administration is acutely aware of these experiences, and it must ensure we avoid repeating mistakes and build on success.  It is time for more inclusive and pragmatic approaches.

“And we’re not throwin’ away our shot!”

We created the National EV Charging Initiative to support and inform the Administration as it charts this course.  Participating organizations represent the full spectrum of stakeholders who will plan, finance, build, supply, operate, maintain, and use the national charging network President Biden envisions.  Their collective wisdom provides insight into how President Biden’s 500,000 chargers ought to be designed and deployed, how public and utility dollars can stimulate private investment, and how their own actions, systems, and partnerships need to change to drive efficiencies, promote competition and innovation, and attract capital.

Through this convening we aim to provide a forum in which all voices can be heard and new channels of communication opened.  That’s what we plan to do on January 20th at the “National EV Charging Summit: the first nationwide conversation to address the bold action and systematic changes needed to support a full transition of the on-road transportation sector