Public EV charging is a problem. Biden’s presidency could change that.

California is the most electrified state when it comes to cars: It accounts for up to half of all U.S. electric vehicles sales. But even with Teslas, Nissan Leafs, and Chevy Bolts all over the place, it’s not always easy to find a public charging station without a line, especially when driving long distances throughout California. That doesn’t bode well for other states like Maryland, Colorado, and Oklahoma, which are all trying to encourage more EV sales.

Now that President Biden is in office, we’ll see if his plans to accelerate EV adoption mean the supporting infrastructure (like public charging stations and more fast-charging connections for 30-minute “fill-ups”) will actually come to fruition. The plan outlines 500,000 new EV plugs across the U.S by the end of this decade. But even in an EV-friendly state like California, with nearly 800,000 plug-in EVs and nearly 70,000 chargers, it remains a struggle to charge up when away from home. That means charging capability is already way behind demand. So while half a million is a reasonable goal, it still may not be enough and, to make things more complicated, it’s not just a matter of adding new plugs.

The U.S. has 84,000 public chargers and growing. California alone has 67,343 of them (including Tesla chargers), followed by Texas, Florida, and New York with only several thousand plugs each. Tesla’s Supercharger network has nearly 1,000 stations nationwide, but, like a VIP club, those are only available to Tesla vehicles. Meanwhile Tesla drivers can use any public EV charging network, like EVgo, ChargePoint, or Electrify America.

In San Francisco (and 200 other U.S. cities), free EV charging network Volta has set up stations throughout the city, mostly in parking lots. It’s free because Volta puts up billboard ads near the plugs or encourages shopping at the malls and grocery stores where the stations are located. 

But getting plugged in for the free juice is another story. Before 9 a.m. one December morning (during a pandemic that’s keeping most people at home), the three slots at a San Francisco station near my home were quickly filled. Checking with the Volta app later that night, it was still near impossible to grab a plug. Eventually I snagged a free charge while testing the new Ford Mustang Mach-E — in the middle of the work day.

Beyond finding free electrons, there’s the matter of access to fast or normal (known as Level 2) charging outside a home charger. Biden’s $1.7 trillion clean energy plan includes more than 500,000 new EV plugs nationwide by the end of 2030, along with new tax credits and incentives for EV purchases. His plan could spur up to 25 million new EV sales in the next 10 years, according to a Bloomberg report. But that adds millions of new drivers who will need more access to public charging.

Electric Drive Transportation Association president Genevieve Cullen said in a call before Biden’s inauguration that we have to make sure those new charging stations are publicly accessible. “The ways people use their cars are diverse,” she said. “There needs to be diverse charging options to meet them.” 

Chargers need to be available near restaurants, grocery stores, and even at gas stations. Even if 80 percent of EV charging happens at home, as Cullen cited, there needs to be more charging spots near apartment buildings.

Anne Smart, vice president of public policy at charging network ChargePoint, wrote in an email that the pandemic amplified the need for more varied charging locations. “As home became both a residence and workplace,” she wrote, “we saw an increase in residential charging coupled with significant increases in interest for multi-family properties as property owners explore ways to offer charging as an amenity for residents.”

Adding more public charging stations is a “street-by-street issue,” as Katherine Aguilar Perez, associate principal at engineering consulting firm Arup, said in a recent phone call before the inauguration. Her firm developed a tool to help cities and communities “make better informed decisions where EV infrastructure was going to be installed.” 

The dashboard, called Charge4All and still in the beta testing phase,  shows the suitability of different locations in Southern California in an effort to encourage more curbside charging. Different layers on the tool’s map show the street gradient, curb height, the nearest power source, and more. 

Perez believes policymakers at the federal level will be receptive and that “they understand the local context.” While she works with local agencies like the Los Angeles Department of Water & Power and the Southern California Edison utility, she’s seen how state and local departments and charger manufacturers can take the local tool to make decisions at a higher level.

As a Massachusetts Institute of Technology paper published Thursday in Nature Energy found, installing more charging stations on regular streets instead of parking garages and shopping malls will encourage more EV adoption. The MIT energy studies professor behind the paper and her students found that this helps to make charging more accessible while drivers are going about everyday activities. Perez echoed the MIT findings when she described this common charging behavior as “getting a sip here and there,” instead of plugging in for a long charge.

Perez noted the pandemic has shown the importance of public and accessible charging stations to encourage everyone, not just affluent drivers, to go electric. “COVID has brought up inequities that are existing in our communities.”

On top of building out an equitable EV strategy, EDTA’s Cullen said that the “incoming administration has a real commitment to building EV leadership.” Biden’s Department of Energy secretary pick is former Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm. As governor she was a big champion for lower-emission vehicles, even in her car-centric state. Former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg looks likely to be confirmed as Biden’s secretary of transportation. He too supports widespread EV adoption beyond California.

Even if the Biden administration is poised to throw in a lot of money and pro-EV leadership to support electrification, it’s not as simple as installing charging stations and moving along. It’s about assessing where those stations should be located, sourcing a sustainable electric power supply, and bringing the price of EVs down while simultaneously increasing battery charge capacity. That’s no easy task.