Plugging In: A Stakeholder Investment Guide for Public Electric-Vehicle Charging Infrastructure is designed to inform potential investors about the costs, revenues, and benefits of charging infrastructure. It presents some overarching conclusions while the accompanying model allows investors to examine the likely costs, revenues, and benefits for their specific investment scenario. While we applaud groups who install charging stations out of good will, this guide is for those stakeholders who want to understand the business case for infrastructure build-out. This report puts forward a business analysis and pathway to profitability for plug-in vehicle charging station investment.

Download the full report or click through the pages below.

Access the Excel model that goes along with the report.

Table of Contents

Executive Summary: A Look at Charging Station Investment………………..3
List of Terms and Definitions………………..4
Summary of Costs and Benefits of Charging Stations………………..6
Analyzing Scenarios Using the Investment Tool………………..12
Exploration of Other Stakeholder Discussions………………..14
Concluding Thoughts………………..15
Appendix A: Menu of Hardware Options………………..17
Appendix B: Assumptions for Investment Tool Runs………………..21
Appendix C: Federal and State Incentives for Charge Station Investment………………..22
Contact Information………………..26

Executive Summary:

Transportation accounts for a quarter of green house gas emissions, one third of household
spending, and a third of the fossil fuel consumption in the US. Major changes to the transportation
sector are overdue and could have positive impacts on our economy, security, health, and natural
environment if we make the right choices. Vehicle electrification is one way to reduce petroleum use
and has gained significant momentum as of late. With support from federal and local incentives as
well as huge investments from automakers, plug-in electric vehicles are a near term reality. The
successful penetration of plug-in vehicles depends greatly on the thorough build-out of both
residential and public charging infrastructure.1 Certain local businesses, municipalities, and other
local players can benefit from the prudent investment in charging infrastructure. This paper
describes key benefits of constructing charging infrastructure, situations in which such construction
proves a prudent investment, and situations in which it does not.
Plugging In: A Stakeholder Investment Guide for Public Electric-Vehicle Charging Infrastructure is designed to
inform potential investors about the costs, revenues, and benefits of charging infrastructure. It
presents some overarching conclusions while the accompanying model allows investors to examine
the likely costs, revenues, and benefits for their specific investment scenario. While we applaud
groups who install charging stations out of good will, this guide is for those stakeholders who want
to understand the business case for infrastructure build-out. This report puts forward a business
analysis and pathway to profitability for plug-in vehicle charging station investment. For more
information on the environmental and community-based benefits that vehicle electrification offers,
please see see RMI’s Project Get Ready work at http://projectgetready.com, which specifically helps
communities prepare for vehicle electrification.
To estimate the return on investment stakeholders can expect when investing in charging station
infrastructure, RMI created a user-friendly investment tool. Individuals can enter unique stakeholder
information, and the tool will then estimate future cash flows. This paper discusses and analyzes the
results generated by this investment tool for general scenarios. Interested stakeholders can use the
tool to explore the results of various investments for their personalized scenarios.
The tool allows the users to determine which key inputs drive charging infrastructure profitability. A
few factors stand out as particularly critical to a successful investment. Stakeholders should
investigate thoroughly hardware installation costs, as these can vary considerably depending on the
chosen installation site. Installations costs and time vary greatly depending on existing infrastructure
and available conduit. For example, a hardware installation with adequate existing conduit should be
relatively inexpensive as opposed to a job that includes upgrades to the electrical system, destruction
of sidewalks or walls, and large distances to existing conduit. For this reason, investors may decide
to include charging infrastructure build-out in planned construction or retrofit projects. Hardware
choice is also critical, especially if the investor hopes to track users and charge a fee to help offset
initial capital costs. Federal, state, and local incentives, sometimes offsetting half of the hardware
costs, reduce the burden of initial capital costs, and may also lower operating costs (for example,
some incentives provide discounted electricity rates). These factors alone can affect costs by
thousands of dollars, making the different between a loss and profitable investment.
The profitability of charging station investment will be heavily dependent upon the penetration of
electric vehicles within the next decade. However, this penetration remains an unknown variable.
Automotive companies are lining up to introduce 2010 and 2011 model year plug-in electric vehicles
(PEVs) to the U.S.. The success of these vehicles will depend on a multitude of interdependent
factors such as the strength of the economy, the price of gasoline, the continuation of federal and
state subsidies, consumer education, the possible emergence of breakthroughs in internal
combustion engine technology and platform efficiency, and the existence of public and residential
charging infrastructure. Every major automaker is planning to release a PEV in the next few years
and the current administration established a goal of one million plug-in vehicles on the road by
2015. However, neither this nor building charging infrastructure guarantee widespread consumer
adoption, but they will help relieve range anxiety and build interest in plug-in electric vehicles.

Leave a Comment