General Motors says it doesn’t want to pay out of pocket to set up fast chargers for electric vehicles and is instead looking for an outside investor to help it set up a charging grid in the United States.
The automaker announced in May that it had partnered with construction company Bechtel Corp., which is the largest construction company in the United States, to build thousands of fast-charging stations for electric vehicles all over the U.S.
The chargers won’t be built by GM or Bechtel, however. Instead, the two companies are setting up a completely separate entity to handle the project and are looking for outside investors to sink some cash into the project to get it off the ground. Bechtel will handle the construction side of things, while GM will provide relevant vehicle location data that will let the company know where to build the chargers.
“We don’t wish to spend our capital to build fast chargers,” GM vice president for electric vehicle charging and infrastructure, Mike Ableson, GM’s vice president, electric vehicle charging and infrastructure, said during the CAR Management Briefing Seminars in Michigan this week. “We wish to spend our capital to build more EVs.”
Ableson said that no new investors have signed on since it first went public with the announcement in “quite confident we can get interest from outside investors.”
GM’s approach is different to that of Tesla, which has elected to spend its own money on a network of fast-charging stations that it calls the Supercharger network. Porsche is also investing in a network of fast-charging stalls for the launch of its electric Taycan sedan, although the first Porsche charging stations will appear at Porsche dealerships, and it forced stores to pay for those stalls and their installations out of pocket.
A number of other private companies are also investing in U.S. charging networks, some of which are owned or partially owned by automotive manufacturers, such as VW’s Electrify America.
Despite the rising popularity of electric cars, a question mark still hangs over charging infrastructure, with arguments abound as to whether they should be paid for by automakers, private entities such as charging companies and fuel stations, or set up and/or subsidized by the government.
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Source: Automotive News
Comments
It shouldn’t be the responsibility for General Motors to build EV Fast Chargers as it’s up to the population, if states like California and New York want EV then it’s up to their state to build EV Fast Chargers especially if they can afford to offer free education and healthcare for illegals then there has to be sufficient money in the budget to build charging stations.
GM continues to make bad decisions in the BEV market. They refuse to acknowledge the whole picture. They should be investing in and developing all aspects of the BEV future.
To me, this continuing discussion re GM and BEV recharging is frustrating. GM had the perfect short and medium term solution to the range anxiety/recharging infrastructure problem in the Volt and Voltec technology. 80% of the US population lives in metropolitan areas, with 50% in suburban areas (2000 census). As GM proved in studies (probably by OnStar) 95% of their driving was 50 miles or less, which means at least 76% of driving could have been transferred to electric propulsion, with no additional public charging infrastructure being required. This is the market that the Volt was designed to serve, and served well, ask any Volt owner! But, GM decided in spite of these facts, to not effectively market the Volt to these potential EV customers, many of whom would have gladly transitioned to BEVs when the actually usable recharging infrastructure was really in place. Instead GM kills the Volt with vague promises of an “all EV future” with no real plans to supply the expensive infrastructure required in 80% of the USA. Do these people (GM management) ever think beyond what the stock analysts bloviate about?
At some point there will be fees to use these chargers. Nothing is free! In NJ there is a push for a huge electric plant near MetLife Stadium to provide power for NY City. There goes your clean electric vehicles up the smoke stack.
Newer power plants don’t use coal as before. They will burn clean natural gas instead, which is a U.S. product and cheaper than oil.
The location and installation of EV chargers should be handled by the market. Some gasoline stations are adding the chargers voluntarily as they know the change from gasoline to electricity is coming, so their loyal customers can swap to an EV and continue to get energy and other services there. I expect all new chargers to follow the SAE J1772 standards for Level 2 and Level 3 DCFC since ALL the EV manufacturers (even Tesla and Nissan) can use them. But I also expect the charging rates to be conveniently priced for travelers who need to charge away from home.
Why doesn’t GM work with the DOE to set up more charging stations, and EPA gives them additional credits for doing so. That way, we get more chargers and more EV adoption.
That NJ power plant will be the States biggest polluter and add impact the air quality of wetlands. Keep plugging in those cars and electric bikes. They don’t pollute. Wrong. Not to mention the gas pipe lines that have to be dug and disturb more sensitive land.
You are correct, instead of calling them zero emissions vehicles. They should be called remote emissions vehicles.
A valid point, except the remote emission sources can, in theory at least, be better mitigated and controlled than millions of potentially unmaintained automobiles. To the extent nuclear, solar, and wind, etc, type generation is employed they can be considered to approach being “zero emission”.
“A valid point, except the remote emission sources can, in theory at least, be better mitigated and controlled than millions of potentially unmaintained automobiles.”
^This.
It’s emissions from millions of smaller point vectors (cars) versus a single large point vector (the plant).
With the plant, you’ve already narrowed the point of pollution to a single place. All that’s left to do is choose the best means of producing electricity. Some production means are cleaner than others. Some are cheaper than others. Some are better suited for some climates over others.
https://youtu.be/LoAVidLpdVc
Studies show the pollution from battery powered cars from manufacture to disposal is more polluting when you add all things to create and destroy a battery and fossil fuel to make electric to charge it. These are not a cure all.
Maybe not a cure all but perhaps, as I implied above, a way to get pollution away from distributed sources in places of high population density to more remote and more containable locations. You have another good and valid point with the significant pollution involved in the battery life cycle. But the environmentalists don’t seem to care so much if the pollution is in China?
The plugs should be universal. That way there is a incentive for the investor to build these and have the whole market of electric cars. Not just tesla cars but all.