Dive Brief:

• American Electric Power has reached an agreement with the Electric Vehicle Charging Association and several other parties, setting forth a plan to spend almost $10 million on rebates for charging infrastructure in the utility's Ohio service territory.
• The plan calls for 300 level 2 charging stations and 75 direct current fast chargers — more than doubling the 280 public charging stations in Ohio today, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.
• Rebates will be provided to site hosts to purchase, own and maintain charging equipment, with emphasis on locating chargers in workplaces, at businesses and on government properties.

Dive Insight:

NRDC, a party to the collaborative agreement, said it expects the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio to approve the EV infrastructure plan based on its broad support. 

If approved, it would be "the first public charging station program to be authorized by regulators in the Midwest, paving the way for greater power sector engagement to accelerate the EV market to the benefit of all utility customers," the group said.

The pilot program aims to develop detailed information on the effectiveness of various electric vehicle program design elements, and will help to better develop proposals in the future. PUCO is also sponsoring PowerForward, a proceeding that explores how the state’s utility customers can benefit from distributed resources. And last summer, the city of Columbus won the U.S. Department of Transportation $40 million Smart City Challenge with a proposal that included EV charging infrastructure.

In addition to AEP, NRDC and EVCA, commission staff, Sierra Club, and the Environmental Law and Policy Center were also involved in the proposal.

As part of the proposal, AEP will also gather data and publish regular, public reports on several station metrics, including the prices charged, use and their reliability.

“The stipulation agreement is the result of trust and hard work put in by all parties to reach a scalable, sustainable program to support electric vehicle drivers in Ohio,” EVCA President Terry O’Day said in a statement.

O'Day said the rebate program model has been successfully utilized in other areas of the country, and "will quickly support drivers with valuable charging programs and low administrative costs."