ChargePoint to punctuate Californian highways with fast chargers

In the USA, ChargePoint has received awards, through its partners, of more than $19 million to deploy 248 DC fast charging ports at 45 sites along California highways.

ChargePoint has just announced the large award that was approved last week by the California Energy Commission (CEC) and the California Department of Transportation. The funding is part of the state’s first tranche of National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program funds.

The 45 sites sporting 248 DC fast chargers from ChargePoint now funded are to be located along stretches of highway suffering EV-charger congestion. The expansion of the DC fast charging across interstate highways like 1-5, is said to be much needed to connect California’s largest cities.

ChargePoint says that most of the awarded sites will feature its Express Plus charging station, which is a modular DC fast charging platform that can charge with speeds up to 500kW. The stations can simultaneously charge two vehicles.

Just last month, in August 2024, ChargePoint announced it was using artificial intelligence (AI) for fault diagnosis at charging stations. The tool integrated into the company’s app reports defective charging points and uses AI to identify problems on site.

California is charging ahead (pun intended) with electric vehicle charging infrastructure so that the already numerous initiatives alone this year are too numerous to mention here. Some of the more recent examples are – in the last month alone – Travel Centers of America is to build an electric charging hub for trucks in Ontario, California; Electrify America & 4Gen Logistics announced the opening of an electric truck charging station hub in Rialto, Los Angeles has invested in kerbside charging infrastructure along with Beam Global introducing a curbside charging system in California, while Ford and Southern California Edison test smart charging, while the CEC announced $32.7 million to fund 450 public DC chargers, which is likely to have funded the ChargePoint orders. Earlier this month, electrive talked to Dustin Schell from the California Energy Commission (CEC) about Californian policies and the current state of play with charging across the state (video).

chargepoint.com