Dive Brief:

• Kansas City Power & Light has put on hold parts of its plan to install 1,100 charging stations, Midwest Energy News reports, following last month's rejection of the utility's plan to ratebase the investment.
• The Kansas State Corporation Commission in September said the utility had failed to demonstrate a need for the proposed Clean Charge Network. 
• The utility installed 230 chargers out of a planned 315 in Kansas side of the Kansas City metropolitian area, but will hold off on the remaining 85. 

Dive Insight:

In their September ruling, Kansas regulators noted concerns about cross-subsidization, saying the utility failed to show demand for the charging stations. Even if it could prove the environmental benefits, the commission said it had previously rejected societal benefit tests.

A utility spokesperson told MEN in an email that it would revisit the plan down the road, and that its program on the Missouri side of the Kansas City metro area was still in progress.

KCP&L's charging station program was among the most aggressive in the nation, and at the time it was proposed, it was the largest. The utility had proposed installing more than a thousand charging stations, and requested $5.6 million of that be passed on to all customers alongside $250,000 in annual spending to maintain them.

Regulators found several issues with the plan, however. They said KCP&L was building more stations than necessary, the environmental benefits of the plan were difficult to quantify, and the utility lacked sufficient data to support its proposal.

"While stimulating EV ownership and usage may be a laudable goal, it is not within the scope of KCP&L providing sufficient and efficient service," regulators concluded. "Promoting EV ownership and usage is better left to the automobile industry."