It didn't take Pete Buttigieg long after being nominated by President-elect Joe Biden for Secretary of Transportation, to mention his intentions to expanding EV infrastructure in the US. 

It shouldn't come as a big surprise, because we've heard Buttigieg speak favorably of electric vehicles on many occasions before. However, it's a good sign that "Mayor Pete" mentions investing in public charging infrastructure within a week of being nominated. 

 

As Secretary of Transportation, Buttigieg would oversee over a dozen administrations employing 55,000 employees and have an $87 billion budget. Buttigieg still needs to be confirmed by the Senate, sometime after Biden is sworn in as the 46th President on January 20th.

"Jobs, infrastructure, equity, and climate all come together at the DOT, the site of some of our most ambitious plans to build back better," Biden said in the Buttigieg announcement. "I trust Mayor Pete to lead this work with focus, decency, and a bold vision — he will bring people together to get big things done.”

We were especially happy to see "and make it available in all parts of this country" in Buttigieg's tweet. There are many severely underserved areas in the US when it comes to EV charging infrastructure, and that needs to change. 

That's mostly because infrastructure companies are currently putting the chargers where electric cars have already begun to proliferate. While that makes sense, it also leaves out many rural areas that aren't very populated and where very few electric vehicles reside. However, the lack of public charging in those areas contributes to the low EV adoption rate.

Therefore, we'd like to see the government pay special attention to areas where infrastructure is non-existent or lacking because the private networks like Electrify America, ChargePoint, and EVgo will continue to expand their presence in the areas that are already ripe for the service. 

2020 Chevy Bolt EV
A 2020 Chevy Bolt EV charges up on an Electrify America DC fast charger

Buttigieg's tweet also mirrors what we've been hearing from President-elect Biden. Biden's infrastructure plan called for installing 500,000 electric vehicle chargers in the US by 2030. BloombergNEF recently took a look at Biden's EV infrastructure plan and concluded that such an expansion in EV charging infrastructure could encourage the sale of as many as 25 million electric cars and trucks.

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