With a confidence vote looming in the B.C. parliament, the reigning Liberal government has announced that Thursday’s scheduled throne speech will include a commitment of $50 million to build 4,321 new EV charging stations over the next five years. “We really want to encourage the electrification of our transit fleet, which is about 40 per cent of our emission profile in the province,” said Jordan Sturdy, B.C. Environment Minister at a press conference.
According to Sturdy, the Liberals plan to use $38 million to support the establishment of level 2 chargers which can replenish a car’s electric battery in five hours.
The remaining $12 million will be set aside to create 110 fast chargers, which are able to top up a vehicle in 30 minutes.
There is currently no public business plan concerning the location of the chargers and the intention to beef up the province’s charging infrastructure was not mentioned in the party’s campaign platform or budget announced in February.
“This is in our climate leadership plan and it has always been identified as a phased approach,” said Sturdy. “This is something that has been in mind for a long time,” he added.
The B.C. Green Party, which did commit to increase the province’s electric vehicle charging network during the last election, share a total of 44 combined parliamentary seats with the B.C. NDP party.
The Liberals hold a total of 43 seats. The confidence vote is scheduled for next week.
