SoCal apartment communities to get EV charging support they need

The largest charging infrastructure program approved for any single utility in the country so far dedicates 40% of its 22,000 charging ports to apartment communities.

 By Ron Freund: Electric Auto Association Board Member 

Last week the California Public Utilities Commission which regulates the state’s electric utilities and assures Californians' access to a safe and reliable utility infrastructure took steps to help electric vehicle (EV) driving consumers (and wanna' be EV drivers) by approving Southern California Edison’s (SCE) $436 Million "Charge Ready 2" program. 

Originally proposed in 2018, the program promised to deploy over 40,000 charging ports at various multifamily communities, workplaces, and urban destination centers over the next four years. Apartment buildings account for more than a third of households in SCE’s service territory and therefore 40% of the effort will focus on this segment. 

Of special note, the program has established a "default arrangement" where site hosts would “pass through” time-of-use (TOU) pricing signals to EV drivers so that maximal financial benefit for the drivers as well as for the grid can be realized. This was recommended by the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) in their proposal comments and taken verbatim. This will help promote charging consistent with grid conditions and help drivers realize fuel cost savings.

The NRDC blog post below discusses the program’s core components in more detail. 

We hope that the state's other two IOUs will come up with similar approaches to bolster the state leadership in electrification of transportation, since not everyone lives in single-family homes or has easy access to charging, especially now that "going to work" doesn't necessarily mean commuting anymore. 

Read the full article by Miles Muller Attorney, Climate & Clean Energy Program, for the NRDC.