In 2021, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act included $7.5 billion to build 500,000 public charging stations for electric vehicles (E.V.s) across the country in an effort to boost a switch to the use of clean energy.
As Reason reported in December, not one charger funded by the program had yet come online. Now, six months later, the number of functional charging stations has ticked up to eight.
That news comes from an Autoweek article earlier this month. In March, The Washington Post reported that only seven were built; a charging station in Bradford, Vermont, opened in April, containing four E.V. fast chargers. Public chargers are either Level 2, which use alternating current electricity and take several hours to fully charge an all-electric vehicle from empty, or Direct Current Fast Charging (DCFC) superchargers, which use direct current and can charge in less than an hour.
Why so little progress? Alexander Laska of the center-left Third Way think tank told Autoweek''s Jim Motavalli that the federal cash "comes with dozens of rules and requirements around everything from reliability to interoperability, to where stations can be located, to what certifications the workers installing the chargers need to have." Laska says the regulations "are largely a good thing—we want drivers to have a seamless, convenient, reliable charging experience—but navigating all of that does add to the timeline."
A spokesperson with the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program, which administers $5 billion of the $7.5 billion total, further told Motavalli that the delay is because "we want to get it right."
Thankfully, federal grants aren''t the only way to build out charging infrastructure.
"US drivers welcomed almost 1,100 new public, fast-charging stations in the second half of 2023, a 16% increase," Bloomberg''s Kyle Stock reported in January. And not just in big cities or progressive enclaves: Deep-red Idaho "switched on 12 new [DCFCs] between July and December," while "Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee welcomed 56 new fast-charging stations in the second half of 2023, an infrastructure increase of one-third."
While Stock notes that $5 billion of federal money is expected to roll out soon, "the vast majority of chargers added in the US last year were bets by for-profit companies on the future of battery-powered driving."
The most prominent company by far is Tesla, whose network of Superchargers includes over 57,000 DCFC chargers around the world and generated an estimated $1.74 billion of revenue in 2023 alone. Just in the fourth quarter of 2023, the company built 357 new stations, accounting for 3,783 charging ports.
Around two-thirds of all public chargers in the U.S. are manufactured for Teslas, but the company has also expanded its network for its competitors to use: In the 2025 model year, most major automakers'' E.V.s will use the same charge port as Teslas and be able to access the Supercharger network.
Rivian, a Tesla competitor, is also building out its own DCFC network: In February 2024, it counted 400 chargers in 67 locations, with plans to expand further, and just like with Tesla''s Superchargers, Rivian plans to make its chargers accessible to other models.
In fairness, both Tesla and Rivian have benefited from government handouts: State and local governments in Georgia promised Rivian a raft of incentives worth up to $1.5 billion. And Tesla has received at least $2.8 billion in federal, state, and local subsidies over the years, despite CEO Elon Musk''s professed distaste for government intervention in the economy. In fact, Politico found in February that Tesla was the single largest recipient of funds disbursed by the federal NEVI program, winning "almost 13 percent of all EV charging awards from the law, earning it a total of more than $17 million in infrastructure grants."
But those companies still provide the best template for expanding access to public chargers.
While proponents of the federal regulations may defend the amount of red tape involved in the federal program, with demands on where a charging station can be placed and the types of licenses people need to build one, the fact is that the private sector is already building out a nationwide E.V. charging network that will be available to most drivers.
Joe Lancaster is an assistant editor at Reason.
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The White House1600 Pennsylvania Ave NWWashington, DC 20500
Through his Investing in America Agenda, President Biden is building the economy from the middle out and bottom up, creating American-made products in American factories with American workers and positioning the United States as a leader in the clean energy economy. President Biden understands that to compete and win the 21st century global economy, strengthen the American auto industry, and tackle the climate crisis, we must build a convenient and reliable network of made-in-America electric vehicle (EV) chargers along America''s highways and throughout all our communities, especially underserved and overburdened communities.
That''s why President Biden set the country on a path to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 and advance an industrial strategy that will continue to build out the domestic EV and EV charging industry– all while creating good-paying union manufacturing and installation jobs on the way.
Thanks to President Biden''s leadership, we''re on track to meet these historic goals.
Today, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) released the2030 National Charging Networkstudy– a new analysis that quantifies the estimated number, type, and location of the chargers needed nationwide to support rapidly growing EV adoption. The study, produced in collaboration with theJoint Office of Energy and Transportation(Joint Office) and the U.S. Department of Energy''s (DOE) Vehicle Technologies Office (VTO), assesses charging infrastructure needs for light-duty EVs with an unprecedented level of detail, including by accounting for the effects of local variation in EV adoption, climate, travel patterns, housing, and charging preferences.The study finds:
BUILDING A CONVENIENT, RELIABLE, AND FULLY INTEROPERABLE CHARGING NETWORK
President Biden''s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law invests $7.5 billion in EV charging, $10 billion in clean transportation, and over $7 billion in EV battery components, critical minerals, and materials. These flagship programs put a down payment on our nation''s EV future and complement the Inflation Reduction Act''s landmark support for advanced batteries, tax credits for EVs and chargers, and dozens of other Federal initiatives.
One of the flagship programs for EV charging is the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program (NEVI), a $5 billion initiative to create a national network of high-speed EV chargers along major highways and interstates. All 50 states, Washington DC, and Puerto Rico are participating in the NEVI program, and the first two years of funding alone will electrify over 75,000 miles of the national highway system.
IMPROVING RELIABILITY OF EXISTING CHARGING INFRASTRUCTURE
Reliability and availability are critical to enabling confidence in charging. That''s why the Biden-Harris Administration is complementing its charging standards with a multi-pronged approach to both build new, reliable charging infrastructureandimprove, fix, or replace existing infrastructure. In addition to the Joint Office''s work with the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) to review NACS as a potential public standard on an expedited and unprecedented timeline, the Administration''s approach is driving forward with key pillars including:
To bring together industry, State and local partners, DOE and DOT willhost a summitin early July to discuss and collaborate on how all partners involved are working to achieve the Administration''s EV charging goals.PROGRESS TO DATE ON AN EV FUTURE
At the same time, Federal funds are attracting a generational wave of private investment to ensure that the clean energy transition is powered by American manufacturing and creates and sustains good-paying union jobs. Since President Biden took office, the private sector has announced well over $130 billion of new investment for electric vehicle, battery, and EV charging manufacturing in the United States.
These investments also span more than just personal EVs – the Administration is investing in medium- and heavy-duty clean energy and electric vehicles. Yesterday, theFederal Transit Administration announcednearly $1.7 billion for low- and no-emissions buses and transit projects, that will more than double the number of zero-emission transit buses on America''s roadways – and they will be manufactured with American parts and labor. And later this year, the EPA will announce the next round of awards from the $5 billion Clean School Bus Program to lower emissions and promote safer environments for children to learn and grow.
For more information on these announcements visitdriveelectric.gov. Seeherefor amore comprehensive list of investments in EV charging in the United States.
We''ll be in touch with the latest information on how President Biden and his administration are working for the American people, as well as ways you can get involved and help our country build back better.
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