In a new white paper, the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) has quantified the gap in charging infrastructure across the 100 most populous US metropolitan areas in the US to power more than 3 million expected electric vehicles by 2025.

Broadly, the team found that of the 100 areas, 88 had less than half of the total needed charging infrastructure in place, based on their expected electric vehicle growth.

The figure illustrates the deployment of public and workplace charging infrastructure through 2017 as a percentage of what will be needed by 2025 across the 100 most populous US metropolitan areas (the 50 most populous are labeled). Shades of red indicate that less than 50% of the needed charging has been installed through the end of 2017, while blues indicate that more than 50% of charging needed in 2025 was in place by 2017.

The authors said that their analysis led to three high-level conclusions:

1. Much more charging infrastructure is needed to sustain the transition to electric vehicles. Across major US markets through 2017, about one-fourth of the workplace and public chargers needed by 2025 are in place. Charging infrastructure deployment will have to grow at about 20% per year to meet the 2025 targets identified in this report. The largest charging gaps are in markets where electric vehicle uptake will grow most rapidly, including in many California cities, Boston, New York, Portland, Denver, and Washington, D.C.

2. Planned infrastructure deployment activities are promising, but uneven. There are many government and industry developments underway to deploy the necessary charging infrastructure, and electric utilities are especially positioned to support this infrastructure deployment. In California and other zero-emission vehicle markets, announced measures and planned installations are slated to fill the charging gaps, but such utility and government efforts are largely absent in much of the country. Cities, states, automakers, and utilities with electric vehicle growth ambitions can learn from these leading markets to fill the charging gaps.

3. Increased charger utilization brings infrastructure investment opportunities. Across US markets where the most charging is needed by 2025, automaker commitments to deploy electric vehicles and the zero-emission vehicle regulation virtually assure increasing electric vehicle uptake. In addition, market expansion, economies of scale, and improved charging technologies will promote higher utilization of chargers. The number of electric vehicles supported by each charger is anticipated to increase by 35% for public Level 2 and 65% for fast chargers by 2025.

This analysis provides a reference for the charging infrastructure needs for a growing electric vehicle market in the United States, including detailed estimates of the amount of each type of charging needed at a metropolitan-area level. The broader conclusion is that, despite the many uncertainties, there will be attractive opportunities for the foreseeable future to deploy charging infrastructure to power a growing electric vehicle fleet. As the electric vehicle market expands, sustained policy and collaboration among government and private industry players is needed. To this end, leading markets are already deeply engaged and serving as models. Although much work remains, progress toward the charging infrastructure system of the future is well underway.

—“Quantifying The Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Gap Across U.S. Markets”

Resources

• Michael Nicholas, Dale Hall, Nic Lutsey (2019) “Quantifying The Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Gap Across U.S. Markets”