Biden grants $623 million to states, cities for EV charging stations

The Biden administration Wednesday announced $623 million for cities and states to help build a national electric vehicle charging station network, a prominent piece of the president's infrastructure agenda that so far has been off to a slow start.

The grants mark the first round of funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act's $2.5 billion Charging and Fueling Infrastructure Discretionary Grant Program, which complements the IIJA's $5 billion National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure formula program. The NEVI pot provides states with the bulk of the funds to build the "backbone" of high-speed EV chargers.

The latest grants will fund 47 EV charging and alternative-fueling infrastructure projects across 22 states and Puerto Rico, including construction of approximately 7,500 EV charging ports, officials said.

"The electric vehicle revolution isn't coming. It is very much here,'' Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told reporters Wednesday. EV sales make up 9% of all passenger vehicle sales, Buttigieg said. The White House wants EVs to account for half of all new car sales by 2030.

Biden's goal is a 75,000-mile, coast-to-coast EV charging network built out over the next six years that features 500,000 public stations. EV sales have more than quadrupled during the Biden administration, officials said, with four million electric vehicles now on the road.

"We are on an accelerating trajectory to meet and exceed the president's goal to hit 500,000 chargers and build that nationwide backbone,'' White House climate adviser Ali Zaidi said.

Ohio in December opened the nation's first charging station funded through the IIJA. New York has since opened another one, and Pennsylvania and Maine are poised to break ground, Federal Highway Administrator Shailen Bhatt said. "You're going to see a wave of new chargers," Bhatt said. "We'll get there before 2030."

Half of the grant money will go to 36 community projects and half to 11 so-called corridor projects that are located along roadways designated as Alternative Fuel Corridors.

The largest grant of $70 million goes to the North Central Texas Council of Governments to build five hydrogen fueling stations for medium- and heavy-duty freight trucks in Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio.

The New Mexico Department of Transportation received $64 million for its New Mexico Clean Fuel Build-out Project for Medium- and Heavy-duty Electric Corridors for a pair of unincorporated counties along Interstate 10.

A pollution district in San Joaquin Valley, Calif. won $56 million for two truck charging sites along I-5.

Puerto Rico won $51 million for its Puerto Rico Corridors: Alternative Charging and Fueling Infrastructure for All program.