$3.2 Million From The Volkswagen Emissions Settlement Will Pay For Chargers
The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection recently announced it was allocating $3.2 million from the Volkswagen Mitigation Trust to install approximately 827 electric-vehicle charging stations at 533 locations around New Jersey in 2019. New Jersey currently has 786 charging outlets at 322 public locations. The lack of a robust charging infrastructure is one of the biggest obstacles to greater EV adoption by consumers.
Most of the funds ($2.7 million) will go to pay for Level 2 charging outlets (781), which essentially provide 25 miles of driving for each hour the vehicle is charged. The rest of the funding will pay for 40 Level 1 charging outlets, which provide about 4.5 miles for an hour of charging and six (6) Fast D.C. chargers, which can fully charge an EV in 15-20 minutes. Fifty-five municipalities and counties, public parking lots and garages, apartment and condominium complexes, car-share services, hotels, private companies and nonprofit organizations will be receiving the charging stations, according to the DEP. There will also be chargers installed at several New Jersey Transit train stations and at rest stops along the Atlantic City Expressway.
The funding for the charging stations comes from the $72.3 million in funds New Jersey has received from the Volkswagen Mitigation Trust, which is the result of federal actions against the automaker for installing devices that allowed vehicles it manufactured to fool vehicle emissions-testing programs across the country.