Government Market News StaffOn Aug. 16, the Texas Transportation Commission approved the implementation of its Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Plan. After Congress passed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act in November 2021, $407.8 million was awarded to the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) to help place electric vehicle (EV) charging stations along Texas interstates and major highways. This funding is to be used over five years.
Texas approved TxDOT’s EV Plan in 2022 to install EV charging stations across the state. It had also been approved by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). The plan includes information on funding via federal pass-through grants and private sector funding, which could be up to 20% of the total construction costs. Currently, $147 million is available.
A priority of the EV Plan is to place high-powered chargers along the approximately 3,615 miles of Designated EV Corridors within Texas. The plan also proposes to have charging stations every 50 miles along most non-business interstate routes.
The EV Plan is broken into separate phases, and Phase 1 is set to cover the study of 56 proposed locations across the state. The commission was asked to approve those 56 locations for installing charging stations with two connectors per station. It also called for the approval of maintenance funding for the stations for five years. The cost of Phase 1 is estimated to be $55-65M. Future phases of the EV Plan will expand charging to rural and metropolitan areas of the state.
Some of the charging stations will be high-powered at 150kW with the ability to bring most electric vehicles from 10% to 80% in about half an hour.
According to the Texas Electric Transportation Resources Alliance, there are over 215,000 EVs in Texas as of Aug. 15, which is 50% more than in 2022.
