EV charging in Tennessee: What to know
Automakers boost manufacture; government boosts infrastructure
Tennessee’s auto industry is racing toward a heavily electric future, with automakers souping up EV production at sites such as General Motors’ Spring Hill battery plant and Smyrna’s Nissan LEAF assembly lines. The trend lines up with national goals outlined by President Joe Biden, who in August set a nonbinding goal for half of all vehicles sold in the United States to be electric by 2030.
But there’s an infrastructure challenge standing in the way of that goal beyond building more EV factories or producing more cars: Tennesseans need enough EV charging stations to keep their vehicles rolling.
“Having electric vehicle charging stations in homes, at retail locations, at commercial businesses, in parking garages (is) also a big part of electric vehicle adoption,” said Cortney Piper, vice president and executive director of the Tennessee Advanced Energy Business Council.
Agencies from the Tennessee Valley Authority to the federal government are investing to bolster Tennessee’s EV charging network, hoping more chargers will mean more electric vehicles in Tennessee garages.
How many chargers are in Tennessee now?
There are 1,380 individual electric vehicle charging ports at 603 public charging stations in Tennessee, according to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Alternative Fuels Data Center. That’s around 8.7 public charging ports per 100,000 people, putting Tennessee 27th among U.S. states and Washington, D.C. in terms of charging stations per capita.
Many electric vehicles are charged at home, but a readily accessible public charging network is key to alleviating “range anxiety,” or the fear that an electric vehicle will run out of charge mid-trip. A 2019 American Automobile Association survey found that range anxiety was the top consumer fear for Americans buying an electric car, with 57 percent worried that they will run out of charge while driving.
The survey also found that only 5 percent of electric vehicle owners had ever run out of charge on a trip.
What kind of chargers are there?
h Level 1 chargers can supply 4-6 miles’ worth of power per hour of charge and cost between $300 and $1,500 to install. There are only 10 publicly accessible Level 1 chargers in Tennessee, according to the Department of Energy.
h Level 2 chargers can supply 10-60 miles’ worth of power per hour of charge and cost between $400 and $6,500 to install. Level 2 chargers are popular in-home units and are often used to fully charge a vehicle overnight. There are 1,158 publicly accessible Level 2 units in Tennessee.
h DC fast (level 3) chargers can supply 72-270 miles’ worth of power per hour of charge and cost between $10,000 and $40,000 to install. Most proposals for new charging infrastructure in the United States prioritize the installation of DC fast charging stations. There are 212 publicly accessible DC fast charging stations in Tennessee.
What’s in the federal infrastructure bill?
The federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which passed in the Senate but is still awaiting a vote in the House of Representatives, would provide $7.5 billion over five years to expand the United States’ EV charging network. Tennessee would receive $88 million, and the state would also be eligible to compete for $2.5 billion in grant funding for the same purpose.
That $88 million figure could fund up to 8,800 DC fast charging units in Tennessee.
President Biden’s original infrastructure proposal called for an additional $7.5 billion toward a 500,000port electric vehicle charging network and $100 billion in government subsidies for electric vehicles. The plan, which saw substantial cuts in the Senate, would have created tax credits up to $12,500 for electric vehicles produced by union workers in the United States.
Who else is building EV chargers?
The Tennessee Valley Authority and the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation in February announced a partnership to spend $20 million on a network of fast chargers in Tennessee. The plan will install new charging locations every 50 miles along Tennessee’s major roads and highways and bring around 50 new charging stations to Tennessee.
In July, the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation announced a plan to bring new charging stations to all 56 Tennessee state parks as soon as fall 2021.
What about Tesla?
Tesla, the ubiquitousn brand that owns 74 percent of the U.S. electric vehicle market, owns more than 25,000 “Supercharger” ports in the United States. The company’s network of more than 7,600 charging ports at more than 900 charging stations in the United States dwarfs other private charging networks, but the proprietary Level 3 chargers can only be used by Tesla vehicles.
In July, Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted that the Supercharger network will open to non-tesla vehicles “later this year” but did not provide specifics.