Tesla, along with other electric vehicle companies and environmental groups, asked the Biden administration to invest in charging infrastructure for electric buses, trucks, and other medium- and heavy-duty vehicles.
The groups want the administration to allocate 10 percent of the money for electric vehicle charging in the bipartisan infrastructure bill signed last November — a pot that includes $7.5 billion — to go toward infrastructure for medium- and heavy-duty vehicles, they said in a letter to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg this week.
“Most public EV charging infrastructure has been designed and built with passenger vehicles in mind,” the letter, also signed by the Environmental Law and Policy Center, Moms Clean Air Force, and Lightning eMotors, reads. “The size and location of spaces reflect an interest in servicing the driving public, not larger commercial vehicles.”
Most cars on the road are passenger vehicles. But medium- and heavy-duty vehicles contribute a disproportionate amount of the smog-causing pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions that come from the transportation sector. Electrifying that category of vehicles, then, could remove a greater chunk of emissions; it would have a significant impact on air quality and lessen climate impacts. The US needs a charging infrastructure to make that possible, the letter argues.
The Biden administration has made truck pollution a priority already: the Department of Transportation is funding electric transit buses for state and local governments, and the Environmental Protection Agency proposed a new rule requiring new trucks to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions by 90 percent by 2031.
Read the full letter below.
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