More than a quarter of the energy consumed in Colorado goes to transportation — and a big shift from gasoline toward electricity is expected in the near future.
But before large numbers of consumers sign on, they want to see longer driving ranges on electric vehicles and more public charging stations, especially the kind that can recharge batteries quickly.
“More stations equals more electric vehicles equals more stations,” said Jonathan Levy, director of policy and strategy at Vision Ridge Partners in Boulder.
Fast chargers cut times to 45 minutes from 8 hours. But they cost several times more than slower models and make big demands on the electric grid, and so far, early investors haven’t earned a sustainable return.
“A market failure exists in the overall market for charging. DC fast-charging standing alone as a business case can’t cut it now,” said Philip Jones, executive director of the Alliance for Transportation Electrification and one of several experts who advised the Colorado Public Utilities Commission on transportation electrification this month.
It isn’t uncommon for new technologies to struggle to win public acceptance, especially if different trends need to come together at the same time. There’s even a name for it — the valley of death.
Fewer than 9,000 electric vehicles were registered in the state last year, but sales are rising rapidly and car manufacturers are gearing up for a future where the internal combustion engine plays a smaller role.
By 2030, state forecasts call for more than 300,000 electric cars under a moderate adoption scenario and more than 900,000 in an aggressive one, said Christian Williss, director of transportation fuels and technology program at the Colorado Energy Office.
Utilities will need to supply more electricity and beef up the power grid to get the electrons where they need to go. To help with that, Colorado consumers can expect to see more time-of-use charges that will encourage them to recharge cars during off-peak periods, when air conditioners or furnaces aren’t running hard and dinner has already come off the stove.
The transition will also require answering a constantly changing set of questions, such as how to make the vehicle-recharging network as convenient as possible for consumers, how to recharge the cars of the 37.6 percent of households who rent and how to meet the heavy power requirements of faster-charging stations without putting the grid at risk.
An equitable network
About 85 percent of electrical vehicle-charging now happens at home, typically in a garage, says Will Toor, director of the transportation program at the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project.
Homeowners can plug into an existing outlet, known as Level 1, without any additional equipment or upgrades. On a Nissan Leaf, it would take about 22 hours to get a full charge. Level 2 chargers, which can be picked up at home improvement stores for under $500, can cut that recharge time to 6-8 hours.
Fast chargers, called Level 3, can cut times to under 45 minutes, but they can run $50,000 to $100,000, making them a tough sell without a high volume.
Colorado has more than 500 public Level 2 stations and about 50 Level 3 stations, of which 20 belong to Tesla. The state will need many more chargers to handle future demand, Williss said.
One concern is that landlords don’t have an incentive to install charging stations, especially at older multifamily developments.
“People who don’t live in single-family homes right now are locked out of the electric vehicle market,” said Max Baumhefner, an attorney with the National Resources Defense Council.
One way around that would be to locate more charging stations at work, which would have the added benefit of matching recharging with peak solar energy periods, he said.
“An employee with workplace charging is six times more likely to buy an electric vehicle than one who doesn’t,” said Williss.
But most parking garages weren’t built to accommodate heavy electrical loads and will need to be retrofitted. And in rural areas, where road traffic and vehicle ownership is lower, private companies may simply stay away.
“If we turn this over to the private sector, they will cherry-pick what is the most profitable for them. That leaves the rural and poor communities out,” said the Public Utilities Commission’s Frances Koncilja, one of three commissioners, citing the example of slow broadband speeds in rural areas.
PUC Commissioner Wendy Moser expressed a different concern around fairness. Should all ratepayers dole out for the cost of infrastructure upgrades that right now benefit a small, more well-off segment of society?
“If it is the minority of people who have electric vehicles, why should the majority pay for that?” she asked.
Chris Nelder, manager of electricity practice at Rocky Mountain Institute, said electric vehicles come with much lower fuel and maintenance costs than gas-powered cars.
By 2025, RMI predicts electric cars will cost the same or less than gasoline models to purchase, without any incentives. Once that happens, the economic arguments for going electric will prove compelling, adding to the environmental ones now at play for early adopters.
“It will be good for everybody,” Nelder said. “I’m OK with a certain amount of public investment made to get us there.”
Denver is among the cities making that investment. It unveiled a Level 2 charger on the corner of 14th and Bannock streets this month, billing it as the first public on-street charger at a parking meter in the metro area.
Anyone parking in one of the two spots next to the charger will only have to cover the usual costs for parking at a meter, with no added charge for the electricity.
But the meters limit parking to two hours, a fraction of the time needed to charge a battery using a Level 2 charger. And the single charger cost $14,500 to purchase and install.
A seamless network
If multiple players build out the recharging network without any coordination, electric-vehicle owners could face a frustrating future of fiefdoms and empty quarters when they travel long distances.
Colorado is part of REV West, a recently formed coalition of eight Western states that wants to electrify more than 5,000 miles across 11 major highways in a coordinated way.
Some of the money for that effort will come out of the $68.7 million Colorado received as part of an emissions-cheating settlement reached with Volkswagen. But that will only cover a small fraction of the investment needed.
Coordination would allow for consumers to set up one account and one payment method, preferably a credit or debit card and pay similar rates regardless of where they charge up. It would make sure stations are adequately spaced and could help ensure more uniform pricing.
Another business model would have vehicle manufacturers supply the fast-charging stations.
Tesla has made a large investment to put in “Supercharger” stations across the country. Drivers can use a touchscreen to chart out a map to their destination, complete with a list of charging stations along the way and the time required to recharge.
“You can drive across the country in a Tesla. That’s not to say you won’t have several stops to refuel for a half hour,” said Thad Kurowski, Tesla’s director of policy and business development.
But Tesla’s network is proprietary, with no plans to make it public. Other big electric car manufacturers such as GM and Nissan don’t provide a recharging network for their customers. However, when GM in October announced plans for 20 new electric or hydrogen fuel cell models by 2023, it also promised to bring new electric fast-chargers to market that would not be walled off from vehicles made by other manufacturers.
A flexible network
One of the tensions that regulators and policymakers in Colorado and other states face is trying to prepare for a future that is constantly shifting.
“The stronger the hand the PUC takes, the more you can be assured you are getting the outcomes you want,” said Nelder. “The more you leave it up to the market, the more rapidly you get to innovate solutions.”
For example, the Colorado legislature in 2012 barred investor-owned utilities from owning vehicle charging stations. While that might prevent Xcel Energy from crushing smaller competitors, it could also prevent underserved markets from getting charging stations.
And the technology keeps improving. Electric vehicles continue to come out with longer driving ranges, meaning charging stations can be spaced farther apart and concentrated at overnight locations such as hotels and motels.
Electrification is also coinciding with big advances in autonomous vehicle technology. Vehicles could eventually drive themselves to centralized charging bays at night.
Nelder’s advice for utilities and regulators is to put in the make-ready infrastructure, change rates to encourage recharging in the off-peak hours and “create the opportunities we need for the private sector.”
“Charging should be cheaper than gasoline,” he said, “and it should be sustainable.”
