Due to the punitive and overly aggressive peak demand charges implemented by the PUC and the regulated utilities, CWPMA has been exploring options for members who want to put in E.V. Charging stations. We are planning on running legislation next year that addresses some of the biggest hurdles and key issues station owners face including:
- The Legislature could consider removing the statutory authority for Regulated utilities to sell direct to consumers utilizing the rate base.
- The Legislature could require that the PUC establish a rate structure that doesn’t penalize E.V. charging at the retail level through peak demand charges.
- The Legislature could remove or clarify that the 120% self generation cap is non-applicable to a business if they install E.V. charging. (the idea being that a station should be able to install solar panels to help support battery storage or supplement E.V. charging without being regulated as a utility)
- The legislature would like to give our weights and measures people statutory authority to convene a group to establish rules around pricing and method of sales including disclosure in the retail environment.
What is clear is that not only does every person who buys a E.V. hurt our states infrastructure due to the fact they (especially in Colorado they don’t pay an excise tax equivalency)… every E.V. owner also jeopardizes the electric grid security by placing increased demand on life safety purposes. One of the things that people really don’t think about is the “Last in” rule where if you are on the border of a service zone and your station installs an E.V. charger then that will require the addition of additional transformers by the utility company then you are going to be the one paying for that. This white paper explains a potential solution for operators whose location is under the dictates of a regulated utility.
More on this soon, but as more and more municipal codes, during facility installation or upgrades require the addition of level 2/3 charging, this is a potential solution and is qualified for all the taxpayer subsidized federal and state tax credits (Colorado).