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Is Vermont's EV charging program stuck in park?

A Green Mountain Power EV charging station in Brattleboro is being used to charge a vehicle.
Howard Weiss-Tisman
/
Vermont Public
A Green Mountain Power EV charging station in Brattleboro is being used to charge a vehicle.

The percentage of electric vehicle drivers who used special incentive programs to charge their cars dropped slightly last year.

And lawmakers want to know what they can do to jumpstart the buildout of both home charging and public EV stations statewide.

“We have been hearing about homeowners who want to add chargers for their cars,” said Hinesburg Rep. Phil Pouech, who served on the House Transportation Committee. “And as we try to encourage more people to move toward electric vehicles there are some people, especially in the rural areas, where the cost is a real barrier to do that.”

As we try to encourage more people to move toward electric vehicles there are some people, especially in the rural areas, where the cost is a real barrier to do that.
Rep. Phil Pouech, Hinesburg democrat

Most of Vermont’s utilities offer managed charging programs, where it is cheaper at certain times of the day to plug in and charge an electric vehicle.

But the percentage of EV owners who used those programs last year dropped from 31% of registered EVs to 29%.

It’s a slight decrease, and Vermont still has one of the strongest managed charging programs in the country.

But installing an electric charger at home can be expensive, even with incentive programs through utilities such as Green Mountain Power which pay for the equipment.

Labor, and sometimes additional electric infrastructure upgrades which are required, can prevent some low-income or rural customers from moving ahead with installing electric chargers.

Pouech says the state wants to continue supporting its charging network as the number of EV sales are expected to increase in the coming years.

“Is this a barrier to moving towards our electrification goals for transportation?” Pouech said. “We were moving forward but we seem to have hit some roadblocks.”

For the past four years the Transportation Committee has had the Public Utility Commission put together an annual report on how the utilities have been establishing EV rates to incentivize charging while managing the load on the grid.

The utilities were supposed to have their EV charging rates in place before this past summer, but three of the state’s smallest utilities — Stowe Electric Department, Washington Electric Cooperative and Hyde Park Electric Department — do not yet have the IT infrastructure in place to offer their customers special home charging rates.

And this year the annual report is supposed to include information on the incentive programs across all of Vermont 17 electric utilities, along with the costs and ratepayer impacts of the programs.

The PUC asked the utilities to provide updated information, but the information they sent in was “not sufficient for the reporting that the Commission is required to provide in the Legislative report,” according to a recent PUC order.

So the PUC has ordered all of the utilities into a public hearing this week to get more information on the programs, and the barriers that are preventing a more robust rollout of EV charging stations.

“Electric vehicles draw a lot of power for a short amount of time,” said Department of Public Service Regulated Utility Planning Director TJ Poor. “And we want to encourage as much managed charging as possible in order to ensure that our grid is operating as efficiently and cost effect of possible.”

More from Vermont Public: Vermonters are buying more electric vehicles, but parts of the state are still waiting for chargers

At the hearing, each utility will be expected to provide information on its service upgrade practices.

Regulators want to know what customers are being told when they call up and ask about putting in a home charger.

And they want the utilities to explain what the customer is required to cover in upgrade costs, and if the utility offer rebates or other incentives.

“Vermont is doing very well in terms of how many electric vehicles are being managed,” Poor said. “And I think this workshop will hopefully shed some light on what some of the barriers are. I think the data will help determine whether the service upgrade practices related to the installation of electric vehicle supply equipment is indeed a barrier or not.”

The workshop this week, and report, which is expected to come out early next year, come as the Agency of Transportation is trying to move ahead with a federally-funded EV charging program that is more than a year behind schedule.

Vermont got $9.3 million from the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure, or NEVI, program, and the money will help pay for 60 charging stations at 11 locations along some of Vermont’s busiest public highways.

Vermont hoped to begin installing the federally funded EV chargers in the spring of 2023.

But VTrans is still working out specific site location agreements for some of the chargers.

“The process is completely new. It’s new to state departments of transportation, and it’s new to the federal government,” said VTrans state policy director Patrick Murphy. “The rules have even shifted as of the last few weeks, so it’s been a learning process. We’re creating entirely new infrastructure through new processes. This is not a typical highway construction process.”

Murphy says because there are private landowners, and private companies managing the electric chargers, the process has been slow as they search for safe, accessible, convenient locations for the chargers.

“It’s a very different model than what we’ve had in the past,” Murphy said. “And I think that’s resulted in, sort of, a longer runway for this program.”

Have questions, comments or tips? Send us a message.

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Corrected: December 18, 2024 at 5:19 PM EST
This article has been updated to correct information about the number of Vermont highway charging stations to be funded by the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program, as well as the status of the Agency of Transportation's work to secure locations for them.
Howard Weiss-Tisman is Vermont Public’s southern Vermont reporter, but sometimes the story takes him to other parts of the state.
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