San Diego to spend up to $60 million on hundreds of electric car chargers

(The Center Square) — The city of San Diego plans to spend millions on electric vehicle charging stations that would be installed throughout city-owned properties.

The city's Sustainability and Mobility Department has presented a contract that is scheduled to go before the City Council on Tuesday that would give the rights to build, install and operate 1,250 public-facing electric vehicle charging stations on city property and facilities to the contractor.

The contract would be for 10 years and is part of the city's goal to have 25% of all vehicle miles traveled be from electric or zero emissions vehicles by 2035. One of the city's strategies is to provide EV charging stations at public facilities to give individuals who may not be able to charge their vehicles at their own homes the ability to use the city's public charging station.

The contract has a maximum cost of $60 million but the city projects it would cost far less than that to have the EV charging stations installed.

The city’s “most likely” scenario places 600 slower charging ports (level 2 chargers) by year five and 650 fast charging ports (level 3 chargers) by the end of the sixth year according to the report.

The "worst case" scenario would have the contractor installing 700 chargers with the cost to the city at $14.6 million.