In the next few years, the federal government’s huge investment in infrastructure will start appearing in Mississippi in the form of electric vehicle charging stations along interstates.
The Mississippi Today website reported that the state is getting $50 million over five years to build 30 charging stations. They all will be located within one mile of seven interstates that run through the state. Federal requirements also say the stations must be no more than 50 miles apart.
Like the electric vehicles themselves, the charging stations are expensive: The Mississippi Department of Transportation estimates that each station will cost between $500,000 and $1.5 million to build.
MDOT will seek bids for the stations. Companies that win must pay 20% of the construction cost, with federal money taking care of the rest. Presumably in order to address one of the biggest problems with electric vehicles — it takes a lot longer to recharge a battery than it does to refuel a tank in a gasoline-powered car — each station must have four fast chargers able to supply 150 kilowatts of electricity.
What was most interesting about Mississippi Today’s story was its report that the state has only 145 charging stations. That gives the state about five stations for every 100,000 residents, a figure that compares poorly to the national average of 19 stations per 100,000 people.
The federal money will bring Mississippi’s charging stations to a total of 175, though others may be opened to increase that total. But it’s virtually certain that the state will remain behind the rest of the country in this field. To get to the national average of 19 stations per 100,000, Mississippi would need about 570 locations. We still have quite a ways to go.
There are some logical reasons the state has so few charging stations. One is that Mississippi is largely a rural and small-town state. With a few exceptions, we lack population concentrations that would encourage broad expansion to service a relatively new industry.
Also, electric vehicles may have been slower to catch on in Mississippi, where most people still think a gasoline-powered engine works just fine. If there was a greater demand for charging stations, the market would have responded already.
Finally, there’s a legitimate question over whether these charging stations are profitable. If they were, the government wouldn’t need to build them. Many electric vehicles can be recharged overnight at a driver’s home. If that trend continues, the only motorists who will need charging stations are those driving out of town on interstates and highways.
Having said all that, it’s certain the state will need more ways to recharge. If automakers like General Motors say they plan to sell only electric vehicles by 2035, then we’re looking at a massive switch away from gasoline in just a few years.
That, of course, means that we’re also looking at a massive increase in electricity usage as the number of electric vehicles grows. To put it mildly, this is going to be a challenging transition.
— Jack Ryan, McComb Enterprise-Journal
