Brattle Economists Present Solutions to Increase EV Fast Charging Station Deployment

Brattle Principals Ryan Hledik and Jurgen Weiss have prepared a report for the Edison Electric Institute (EEI), titled “Increasing Electric Vehicle Fast Charging Deployment: Electricity Rate Design and Site Host Options.” The report discusses options to increase the deployment of direct current fast charging (DCFC) infrastructure and facilitate broader adoption of electric vehicles (EVs).

In the report, Mr. Hledik and Dr. Weiss discuss and compare the solutions that are available to increase the deployment of DCFCs, which can be categorized as rate design options or DCFC site host customer options. The rate design options include creating a separate rate class for a customer of a DCFC site host, offering a range of volumetric and demand-based rates, and experimenting with alternative rate designs, among other possibilities. The creation of a separate rate class for DCFC site host customers would allow for the design of a rate that is specific to the DCFC charging needs, and experimentation with new rate designs would allow electric companies and site hosts to learn more about the preferences and charging behaviors of EV owners.

Some of the options that are available for DCFC site host customers include installing energy storage at DCFC stations, managing charging load to avoid demand-related charges, and developing charging stations for an existing base of EV users. The installation of storage or management of charging demand through other methods would help manage the electricity drawn from the energy grid and reduce associated charges on the customer’s energy bill. In order to increase the adoption of EVs and public DCFC deployment, it is important to learn from the approaches being implemented today and evaluate all options with respect to individual electric companies’ ratemaking principles, cost recovery objectives, and overarching policy and regulatory goals.

The full report is available below.

View Report