Electric vehicle…

Electric vehicle infrastructure and the applications associated with them (cloud services, payment apps, etc.) need to be standardized across the province and country. EV drivers need to be able to charge their specific EV at any charger opportunity (i.e. make all the charging input and outputs the same, and require vehicle manufacteurers to follow).

In addition, ensure the cloud services and apps are compatible with different types of EV chargers to reduce the amount of apps and confusion around what service is available at what charger.

In rural areas, residents travel long distances to access amenities. Range anxiety continues to be a barrier to EV adoption in rural communities. More visible and accessible EV chargers are needed at public locations along highly trafficked routes but also on other roads where gas stations were typically present (small towns). Public EV chargers would be useful at amenities where residents spend time (grocery stores, recreation centres, government buildings, parkland).

One challenge for rural municipalities is the cost of installing, owning, operating, and maintaining these assets as they are not affordable. Supportive funding should consider owner/operator/occupancy relationships that enable chargers to be installed on municipal lands without the capital and ongoing cost burden to small and rural municipalities.

Need to consider the implications of EVs on the electrical grid. The electricity grid must continue to be clean and ideally locally produced in order to align with municipalities’ objectives of reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the transportation sector. Funding or incentives to create EV chargers with their own power source (solar panels) or a combination of the two for public buildings would be helpful instead of leaving municipalities to find multiple sources of funding to provide clean electricity to EV users especially where staff and resources are limited such as rural municipalities.