When it comes to EV charging infrastructure, how does your province rank?
Canada is going through a clean-energy transition. Some jurisdictions are more prepared than others
Editor's Note: A previous version of this story miscalculated the number of chargers per vehicle in Canada. The headline said that Canada's most populous provinces were way behind the U.S. in charger availability. The story and graphic have been corrected and updated.
Aug. 8 update: After this story was published, Electric Mobility Canada and Environmental Defence alerted CBC to inaccuracies in data published by Transport Canada. Hydro Quebec also disputed the numbers for Quebec. Transport Canada subsequently confirmed a "technical issue" that substantially undercounted the number of stations in Quebec. Transport Canada says it has corrected and validated its data. This story has been updated.
As Canada continues its clean-energy transition, data compiled from federal sources by CBC News shows how many fast-charging stations there are in each province compared to the number of pure-electric vehicles on the road.
By 2035, 100 per cent of new cars and light trucks sold in Canada must be zero-emission vehicles under federal rules. Some experts say the number of charging stations will need to increase exponentially to meet that mandate.
Looking at Canada's most-populous provinces, there are 1.88 fast-charging stalls per 100 electric vehicles in British Columbia, 2.15 in Quebec, 3.09 in Ontario and 5.11 in Alberta, according to data published by Transport Canada, which CBC is using to compare all provinces.
Nova Scotia has about five per 100 vehicles. Manitoba's ratio is 10.29 while P.E.I. has 7.5 per 100 EVs. Saskatchewan sits at a ratio of more than 22 chargers per 100 EVs, and New Brunswick has more than 18.
(Note: The Transport Canada data suggests there are no fast chargers available for motorists in Northwest Territories and Nunavut.)
CBC also analyzed data from U.S. sources to compare how Canada is faring when it comes to EV infrastructure.
Some say the number of public fast chargers per vehicle is not a useful measurement for how the EV market evolves.
"The more a market matures, including [in] places like Norway, the number of EVs to chargers actually rises," said Nate Wallace, program manager for clean transportation with the advocacy group Environmental Defence.
This shift happens because more people are charging their EVs at home, he said.
Wallace says the new technology requires a "delicate balancing act" between public and private funding. He notes that private companies are unlikely to invest in funding public fast chargers if the market is saturated.
Calls for urgency around infrastructure
An analysis done for Natural Resources Canada in 2021 suggests Canada will need, on average, one charger for every 20 EVs by 2025 and as more EVs roll onto the streets, that ratio is expected to fall to about one for every 49 vehicles by 2050.
Some observers worry a lack of chargers could hold back Canada's commitments to fight climate change — and cause consumers major headaches.
Canada is expected to need about 444,000 EV chargers to meet demand by 2035, Brian Kingston, president of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers' Association, said in an interview. That's up from about 20,000 in service today, meaning the country will need a roughly 20-fold increase in the number of EV chargers in 12 years, according to Kingston.
"The pace of building out this charging infrastructure needs to increase significantly year on year, and I am worried [we] won't meet it," said Kingston. "We have not shown an ability yet to build with the urgency to meet the target."
Since the federal government mandated that new vehicles sold in this country must produce zero-emissions by 2035, it should be Ottawa that is primary responsible for building new charging infrastructure, Kingston said, though provinces, automakers and others also have a role to play.
For its part, the federal government has said it is putting its money where its mouth is. Earlier this year, Ottawa announced more than $1.2 billion in funding to build nearly 84,500 chargers by 2027, among other commitments.
People 'mostly charge at home'
Daniel Breton, president and CEO of Electric Mobility Canada, a group that advocates for EVs, said progress on fast-charger installation is actually coming along pretty well.
The federal government has, for example, met its goal of having 4,300 fast chargers operating nationally by 2025, two years ahead of schedule, he said.
According to Breton, once EV owners have their cars, their anxiety around how far they can drive on a charge and fears about having access to public chargers quickly dissipates.
"You spend the first few weeks figuring out how it works, but people realize they mostly charge at home."
He says he puts an average of 50,000 km on his personal EV annually and has not found access to charging infrastructure to be a problem.
Along with financing charging infrastructure, the federal government has also agreed to help fund massive new subsidies for electric vehicle makers in Ontario, with an eye to attracting "one or two more" projects.
Despite the lack of chargers in some jurisdictions, EV sales in Canada are increasing quickly. The number of EVs on Canadian roads in 2022 was double what it was two years earlier, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada. But challenges loom.
Charger supply impacting EV demand?
Critics of EV mandates say they limit consumer choice, force people to buy more expensive electric vehicles and have little impact on the environment.
"A massive shift in sales of EVs would not detectably change world temperatures," noted a commentary from the Hoover Institution, a U.S. conservative think-tank. It also criticized EV mandates as unrealistic for people who live in cold climates, arguing they typically lose up to 30 per cent of their range and can take twice as long to charge.
Citing consumer research, Kingston said a significant number of Canadian consumers aren't comfortable buying an EV, as they worry about access to charging infrastructure, along with fears about drive range.
Wallace rejects the Hoover Institution's perspective, pointing to 16 studies authored by independent scientists and government agencies noting the benefits of EVs in helping meet climate goals.
Canada has more than one million kilometres of two-lane roads, according to Transport Canada. Some observers say this is why widespread access to charging infrastructure is considered especially crucial for people making longer trips.
Some of the results of CBC's data analysis are surprising. South of the border, the sparsely populated U.S. state of Wyoming, not typically considered a leader on climate change, fared the best for charging stations per number of electric vehicles in that country — although the numbers of both there are small.
The Cowboy State boasts 99 charging stalls for 840 electric cars, meaning there are more than 11 stations per 100 cars.
Earlier this year, Republican legislators in the state proposed a bill that would ban new EV sales by 2035 in Wyoming. The representatives later indicated their bill was something of a joke aimed at taking a dig at California's plan to phase out gas vehicle sales by 2035.
With files from the CBC's Chris Arsenault, The Canadian Press and The Associated Press
