WASHINGTON — The Biden administration said Tuesday it is awarding $521 million in grants to help build out electric vehicle charging and installing more than 9,200 charging points for electric vehicles.
The Ministry of Energy and Federal Highway Administration said $321 million will be allocated to 41 community projects that expand electric vehicle charging infrastructure, while $200 million will be allocated to 10 corridor fast-charging projects.
Milwaukee receives $15 million for electric vehicle installation chargers at 53 locations, while Atlanta will receive $11.8 million to install a DC Fast Charging Hub at the city’s airport with 50 DC fast chargers providing charging for rental carsdrivers of taxi services and airport shuttles.
A complete list of grant recipients can be found here.
The Biden administration has faced heavy criticism for its slow rollout of electric car charging stations under a $5 billion U.S. government program established in 2021.
Automakers and others say a dramatic expansion of electric vehicle charging stations is crucial to the widespread deployment of electric vehicles, and key to U.S. efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. emissions.
The White House’s goal is to expand the nationwide network of charging stations to 500,000 ports, including high-speed charging stations (no more than 50 miles apart) on the nation’s busiest highways.
In August, the United States had 192,000 public charging stations. Since the Biden administration took office, the number of publicly available fast charging stations has increased by 90%.
FHWA said that approximately 1,000 new public charging points are added every week.
As of June, only seven electric vehicle charging stations were installed under the 2021 U.S. program, consisting of a total of several dozen charging ports, said Shailen Bhatt, head of the Federal Highway Administration.
“That’s pathetic. We’re three years into this … That’s a colossal administrative failure,” Senator Jeff Merkley said during the hearing. “There’s something terribly wrong and it needs to be fixed.”
Bhatt said in June that he was frustrated by the slow implementation and said the agency is working with states on their plans to install EV chargers.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has also repeatedly criticized the pace of the deployment.