California’s transition to EVs

In the heart of Silicon Valley, where Innovation Centre Denmark is located, it is very common to see more than one Tesla parked in the driveways. Nearly one out of three cars sold in Palo Alto is an electric vehicle (EV), and the total market share of plug-in hybrids and pure electric cars is about 8 percent in California. Hence, Tesla models - and Leafs, Bolt’s and Prius and more – are taking up a good share of the roads.

California's journey towards greener transportation can be traced all the way back to 1990 with the first regulation within the field, which made sure that car manufacturers over the years have to produce an increasing number of low-emission cars based on requirements that have been created in line with technological developments.
Today, 30 years later, over 700,000 Californians have replaced the traditional gas-guzzler with an electric version, and the state is well on its way to reach its goal of 1.5 million low-emission cars by 2025.

However, the ambitions do not stop here. The Golden State has a goal of 5 million low-emission cars on the roads by 2030. Just this September, Governor Gavin Newsom announced that sales of new petrol and diesel cars would stop in 2035 and onwards.

A large network of charging stations

A well-known reason for people not adapting to EVs is the concern of lack of available charging stations. Over the past decade, the state of California has prioritized building the necessary infrastructure to get more people to replace their gasoline car with an electric car. It has been clear to the Californian government that there is a need for available charging options before consumers are convinced to get an EV.

There are currently approximately 23,000 charging stations across California, and the goal is to reach 250,000 charging stations in total by 2025, of which 10,000 will be fast-chargers. This summer, the state also announced an ambitious 2030 target of 1 million charging stations in California.
To ensure charging options along the entire West coast stretch from the Mexican border to Canada, California has partnered with two neighbouring states, Washington and Oregon, to establish The West Coast Electric Highway, a public-private partnership consisting of a large network of fast charging stations located along the highway every 40 to 80 kilometres.
In terms of the large investments required to build charging stations, the San Francisco-based company Volta Charging has created an interesting business model that secures a source of revenue through advertising.

Volta works with property and business owners to install charging stations in high-traffic areas, such as shopping malls, and offers free charging sessions to visitors through outdoor advertising embedded in the charging stations. This gives EV drivers more charging options on their daily journey, while at the same time making it free for them to charge their car.
Silicon Valley's large companies are also a part of the transition towards greener transport by investing in charging infrastructure. Tech companies like Google, Netflix, SAP and Facebook already started installing their first charging stations in the company's parking lots ten years ago as part of their employee benefits and employer branding.

In 2007 Google launched their ReChargeIT initiative, which has set up charging stations on Google's large campus in Mountain View and has purchased electric cars for their campus car-sharing program for employees, GFleet. After driving an EV at work, several employees have also developed a taste for EVs and attained one themselves.
Charging in the workplace is especially beneficial for employees who does not have a charging station at home. Another advantage to using company chargers is that it typically makes people charge their EV during the day, which is when there is more renewable energy in the grid from the many solar photovoltaic systems in California.Therefore, by charging at work, drivers avoid charging at home after the sun has gone down, where the majority of the electricity is produced using natural gas.