Homer Electric Association is encouraging Kenai Peninsula businesses within its service area interested in advancing the use of electric vehicles on the peninsula to take advantage of the Alaska Energy Authority’s Level-3 Electric Vehicle Charging Program.
Approved hosts through the AEA selection process have the potential of receiving up to $100,000 for installation of Level-3 and Level-2 chargers at their location. The program will use Volkswagen Settlement Trust funds to pay for 80% of the project cost, not to exceed $100,000 per site. Program participants will be required to fund the remaining 20% and any costs in excess of the per site limit.
Bruce Shelley, Director of Member Relations for Homer Electric spoke to KSRM saying that the goal is to install the chargers from Fairbanks to Homer along the main highway corridor, “They’re putting an RFI asking people that are interested to host the electric vehicle chargers, the level 3 chargers, to go ahead and put in an application. Once the application is put in, they will be marry them up within an electric vehicle supply equipment supplier or vendor. At that time, they will vet them through a process to see if the location and the resources are a fit. AEA has put together a points system to help evaluate each host location. Here are just a few of those that the host would be vetted against. The DC fast charger sites must be publicly accessible 24 hours per day, 7 days per week, 365 days per year. All of these chargers must use the CHAdeMo or the CCS charging connector standards with at least one of each connector per site and then maximize usefulness to the drivers.”
Homer Electric Association anticipates two to three Level-3 chargers being awarded within their service area to meet AEA’s goal of one charging station every 50 to 100 miles along the main highway corridor. Anyone who may have questions or are interested in applying for the program are urged to call Bruce Shelley at HEA directly. More information can be found here.