(TheLastPatriotNews.com) – According to a new study, a substantial number of electric vehicle owners struggle to charge their EVs by using public charging stations while they are away from home.
Its findings may complicate the push of President Joe Biden’s administration to stimulate the broader adoption of electric vehicles, commented The Washington Examiner, which cited the results from the survey.
The problem for many EV owners in the US was exposed by the second annual Electric Vehicle Experience Public Charging Study released by J.D. Power, a consumer research firm.
It showed that 20% of EV owners throughout the United States reported having had “operability and maintenance a key issue” at public charging stations.
“The study finds that one out of every five respondents ended up not charging their vehicle during their visit,” J.D. Power said.
“Of those who didn’t charge, 72% indicated that it was due to the station malfunctioning or being out of service,” it added.
The company’s study found that other issues plaguing EV owners in America are the availability – or lack thereof – of charging stations and not having “satisfying” things to do while waiting for the vehicles to charge.
“The National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program promises to provide funds to states for building out their EV public charging infrastructure. This will lead to sizable growth in the availability of EV charging stations, but just adding stations isn’t the answer,” commented Brent Gruber, an executive director at J.D. Power.
He added that stations should be put up in areas with “gaps” along “heavily traveled routes” and in sites of high population density where EV owners may not have access to residential charging.
“Most importantly, [charging stations need to be] designed with things for users to do while charging—regardless of the use case. Then, we need to make sure those stations are reliable,” Gruber argued.
The J.D. Power study surveyed 111,554 owners of battery electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles between January and June 2022.
A report by The New York Times on the survey results quoted University of Massachusetts Amherst’s Ethan Zuckerman, an electric Chevrolet Bolt owner, saying that problems with charging and the long waiting times prevent users from abandoning their gas vehicles.
“Often, those fast chargers have real maintenance issues. When they do, you very quickly find yourself in pretty dire straits,” Zuckerman said.
