General Motors will invest $750 million into electric vehicle charging infrastructure in the United States and Canada, the automaker confirmed during its annual Investor Day presentation held earlier this month.
Ken Morris, GM’s Vice President for Electric and Autonomous Vehicles, said the automaker will make the sizable investment over the course of the next four years.
“Today, GM is announcing an increase in our investment in charging infrastructure to nearly three quarters of a billion dollars through 2025, significantly increasing GM EV owners’ access to reliable Level 2 and fast charging with the superior customer experience of Ultium Charge 360,” Morris said. “This investment will accelerate infrastructure buildout across home, workplace and public charging throughout the US and Canada, and is a key enabler to GM’s EV adoption.”
Currently, GM electric vehicle owners have access to more than 85,000 public charging stations across the U.S. and Canada, which are operated via third-party charging companies. The automaker’s Ultium Charge 360 ecosystem also makes it easy for these owners to locate charge points and pay for energy. There are currently seven charging networks integrated into the Ultium Charge 360 smartphone app, including Blink, ChargePoint, EV Connect, EVgo, FLO, Greenlots and SemaConnect.
“For the widespread adoption of EVs, GM understands that a convenient and robust charging experience is fundamental,” Morris also said. “Ultium Charge 360 is our solution that supports EV owners, dealers, and fleets. It integrates our mobile apps, charging networks, services and products to deliver the best charging experience for GM EV owners at home, at work, or on the go.”
GM’s strategy of investing in third-party charging networks differs from that of Tesla, which has set up its own Supercharger charging network for owners. GM sees this as a sound alternative strategy, ensuring EV owners have access to a suitable charging station no matter where they are in the United States or Canada, Travis Hester, GM’s chief EV officer, said previously.
“As we launch 30 EVs globally by the end of 2025, Ultium Charge 360 simplifies and improves the at-home charging experience and the public charging experience – whether it’s community-based or road-trip charging,” Hester said.
In addition to the Chevy Bolt EV and Chevy Bolt EUV, GM will release a number of new Ultium-based EVs between now and 2025, including the GMC Hummer EV Pickup, GMC Hummer EV SUV, Cadillac Lyriq crossover and Chevy Silverado Electric, among others.
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Comments
and WHO is going to build the Power Generating plants to actually make and distribute the electric to these charging stations…..also, did anyone (?????) investigate the possibility that the electrical grid on each street in the nation is capable of transmitting enough electric to individual homes in order for a owner to add a charging station or two to EVERY home in the US…..kind of think not
This stuff is being researched.
The power company, since in the majority of the country they are a for-profit corporation, so every dollar they spend brings them a government-regulated, guaranteed profit.
If you put in a charging station like this, generally the power company is required to install necessary lines and transformers and eventually power plants, and they are required to bill you so that they get paid back with a profit over 30 years. That’s how regulated utilities work.
In nyc , the cost to build new lines is astronomical since most travel through an underground “subway” conduit which is at full capacity in most areas .
Plus the environmentalist have been fighting the construction of new long distance power lines to bring cheap wind energy into the north east .
What happens when a storm knocks out power for a week ? Are we stuck in the house for a week ? This happens in suburban nyc areas of north Jersey and Long Island often . Some people have whole house generators or portable generators . Where will you get gas for your portable generator .
Unanswered questions
Where would you get gas for your ICE vehicle if you can’t get gas for your generator? You would be just as immobile as the BEV, besides most whole house generators usually run on natural gas or propane.
The grid is realistically scalable – concurrently with the grow of the EV market. Engineering Explained did a video covering this topic. Perhaps stop pulling pointless “what if’s” out of your arse and actually research the subject. You’ll see that people are actively researching and developing this very subject.
Scalable in theory yes, in practice you are probably talking about a complete rebuild from the ground up many times more robust than what is currently built . Hate these propaganda like videos that make things seam like they are so easy and the big bad oil companies are holding it back out of greed .
In the 1990’s there was magazine articles in popular science , scientific American etc speaking how you could simply put a solar panel on your roof and sell your excess electricity back to the grid . No more blackouts for you .Truth was that you needed to rewrite your connection to the utility and the utility needed to invest in tons of new equipment to make it possible . And in blackouts you still lose power
We are now taking the electric grid up a few notches of importance to society . If power goes out due to storm or terrorist act , you are going to be putting lives at risk as people can’t get to the hospital in and emergency , can’t get food etc . You also have a single point of failure that could collapse the economy
The grid in your crap country is worthless I hope one day someone drops EMP on you and you will find out how strong the US is.
EMP won’t do anything to my car at least I have an old jeep.
Charlie, you’re thinking too realistically.
Charlie…thats why I will charge while my solar is humming! I don’t need the feed!
California keeps shutting down power plants and causing power outages, but they want to stop selling gas powered vehicles in 10 years and only sell electric vehicles. How will they supply power to all these electric vehicles if they can’t meet the current electrical demand now?
Smart investors are putting their money in Gerbil Ranches, they will run on the electricity producing wheels for hours without a break
I’d like to see GM eventually invest in a luxury boutique style charging station. Taking the vibe of the Cadillac House and creating charging stations just for GM vehicles.
1. A significant portion of EV charging happens during off peak hours, so this doesn’t require a huge increase in capacity. My level 2 hasn’t crashed the grid yet.
2. Yes there are people who do install solar at home and sell to the utility companies. It’s called net metering and it’s not a huge process.
3. One utility company within 30 miles of me is shutting down a power plant and the site will be used for energy storage/routing.
Just doesn’t sound like the hopeless situation some are describing.
You can build all the charging stations you want. Only issue is where is all the additional electicity gonna come from? Just 2 weeks ago California asked its residents NOT to charge their cars cuz it was short on juice. These folks have their heads in the sand when it comes to the actual power producing capacity/distribution of our electrical system. It’s been over 50 years since we built a nuclear power plant…pretty sad and stupid.
The are two new nuke units going in at Georgia. They aren’t cheap electric, 27b was the last I heard. wind solar and Ng are the cheapest in order. Rooftop solar with storage is probably the most cost effective for society.