The Expert Podcast

If this news is true, it could be another kind of milestone in the development and rollout of electric vehicles as a major method of transportation. Look, a couple of weeks ago, there was news that new car sales of electric vehicles went past 10 percent of all the volume. That's not a majority, but it's more than one percent a couple of years ago, so it's increasing rapidly. One of the biggest obstacles to the adoption of electric vehicles is being able to charge them.

Well, according to this article, there's a national charging network that's rolling out that is going to be ubiquitous and really kind of put gas stations at a disadvantage. If this does happen, that might remove some of the obstacles that people have about buying electric vehicles. They don’t see any electric stations. Think about when you drive around—you see a gas station very prominently on every corner, the big sign, the prices—Shell, Texaco, whatever it is—but you don't see electric vehicle charging stations that prominently. Sure, you see them in the corner of the Target parking lot. Sure, you see the Tesla station maybe in the strip mall. But you don't see them prominently like you see gas stations.

This national network is intending to make them prominently visible, conspicuous, so that electric charging is something that people think about. You know that it's there. You're not going to be afraid that you have to go find one if you have an EV. Right now, electric vehicle charging is kind of like a cat-and-mouse game. It's kind of like a treasure hunt. If you have an EV, you have to look on an app to find out where there's a charging station or just know where they are in town.

Think about if you have a gasoline car. When you're driving, what do you have to do when you need to stop for gas? Nothing. You just drive until you see a big sign sticking up that says "gas station" or the price sign—regular, mid-grade, premium, right? That's what you look for. You see them everywhere. You don't have to look on an app or a map for a gas station. When electric vehicles get to the point where EV charging stations are that easy to find, that's going to break the dam of people being afraid to buy electric vehicles. This national network, according to the article, is designed to do that, and it might make a big difference.

One of the biggest things that will help new car dealers sell EVs is this network—not their advertising, not their discounts, not their marketing. It's going to be people seeing EV charging stations as prominently as they do gas stations. Because if you're on a trip and you're out of town and you don't know that town, you don’t have to play hide-and-seek with a gas station. You just drive until you see one. But charging stations? You probably have to look on a map or an app or be creative in finding one and hope there is one. Nowadays, there's usually at least one in every town, but they're not right in your face like gas stations are.

This could change all that, and if it does—watch out. Because the EVs are going to fly out the door of the dealerships, new and used. And that might be a way to get more of these on the road. Whether you agree with it or not, that's where we're going.