Sep 23, 2025 11:36 PM
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1099474
INTRO: Public electric vehicle charging stations in America have a bad reputation. They’re notorious for breaking down, charging at a snail’s pace, refusing customer payment and leaving drivers stranded without juice. Advocates for electric vehicles, or EVs, worry that reliability concerns are hampering adoption at a critical moment in the campaign to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but data on the topic is limited.
To address this problem, researchers at the University of Washington designed a survey to tease out exactly how much a car owner’s perception of public charging reliability influences their willingness to buy their first EV. The team created a series of hypothetical scenarios to study the factors that might nudge a skeptical shopper towards an EV over a gasoline-powered car, including vehicle and gas prices, driving range and public charging access.
The results were dramatic. Participants with a negative view of public charging were much less likely to choose an EV than those with a moderate view. It took some serious hypothetical improvements to offset those negative perceptions: The EV needed to be discounted 30%, have 366 extra miles of range or there needed to be 30,000 additional public charging stations.
“No one knew how much charger reliability was coloring the decisions of prospective EV buyers,” said senior author Don MacKenzie, a UW professor of civil and environmental engineering. “I was not at all surprised by the direction of the response. What surprised me was the size. These were monster results. This is a warning for the whole industry.”
The research was published June 28 in Transport Policy.
The results come at a tenuous time for EV adoption in America. The market continues to grow, but political factors like the end of federal tax incentives are complicating sales outlooks. The federal government is also challenging California’s plan to phase out gas car sales, which could threaten similar efforts in Washington and several other states.
The state of public charging isn’t inspiring confidence in buyers, either... (MORE - details, no ads)
INTRO: Public electric vehicle charging stations in America have a bad reputation. They’re notorious for breaking down, charging at a snail’s pace, refusing customer payment and leaving drivers stranded without juice. Advocates for electric vehicles, or EVs, worry that reliability concerns are hampering adoption at a critical moment in the campaign to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but data on the topic is limited.
To address this problem, researchers at the University of Washington designed a survey to tease out exactly how much a car owner’s perception of public charging reliability influences their willingness to buy their first EV. The team created a series of hypothetical scenarios to study the factors that might nudge a skeptical shopper towards an EV over a gasoline-powered car, including vehicle and gas prices, driving range and public charging access.
The results were dramatic. Participants with a negative view of public charging were much less likely to choose an EV than those with a moderate view. It took some serious hypothetical improvements to offset those negative perceptions: The EV needed to be discounted 30%, have 366 extra miles of range or there needed to be 30,000 additional public charging stations.
“No one knew how much charger reliability was coloring the decisions of prospective EV buyers,” said senior author Don MacKenzie, a UW professor of civil and environmental engineering. “I was not at all surprised by the direction of the response. What surprised me was the size. These were monster results. This is a warning for the whole industry.”
The research was published June 28 in Transport Policy.
The results come at a tenuous time for EV adoption in America. The market continues to grow, but political factors like the end of federal tax incentives are complicating sales outlooks. The federal government is also challenging California’s plan to phase out gas car sales, which could threaten similar efforts in Washington and several other states.
The state of public charging isn’t inspiring confidence in buyers, either... (MORE - details, no ads)
