EV charging infrastructure is still lagging adoption, report says

There might not be the same degree of optimism regarding electric vehicle adoption as a few short years ago, but the transition toward battery-electric vehicles continues nevertheless. More than 1.8 million EVs had already been sold between the start of this year and the end of August, according to analysts. And even here in the US, there has been a large uptick in drivers considering EVs that they might have written off last year, thanks to escalating fuel prices with no clear end in sight. Despite this, charging infrastructure continues to lag, according to a new report from ChargePoint.

“All in all, things are moving forward. I think the North American market has been better shaped than a lot of the press reports,” said ChargePoint CEO Rick Wilmer. “Part of it is just the data we see in terms of the amount of RFPs that we receive for charging solutions. They haven’t slowed down. We reported quarter over quarter growth in the last quarter we reported. And you look at the data around used EVs going up in price because the demand is so high. I saw a recent report… EV retention rates are 96 percent. So those folks that are putting their leased cars on the used market, they’re not going back to gas, they’re going to another EV,” he said.

Beyond that, cheap electric trucks from Slate and Ford indicate further future demand for charging. “When you look at how much interest there is in the used EVs that are at parity with an equivalent gas vehicle, that tells you the appetite is there for EVs if it’s the right vehicle at the right price point. So I think the auto OEMs, maybe not homogeneously, but they’re figuring out what the market wants in North America and they’re starting to introduce those vehicles, which I don’t think a lot of the forward-looking forecasts accommodate the fact that the product market fit is getting better coming out of the car companies,” Wilmer said.

How many chargers are enough?

ChargePoint says that for 2025, its data shows that there was a 34 percent increase in charging sessions, yet new charger installations only grew by 16 percent. I asked Wilmer what the ideal utilization rate ought to be.