A plan to install electric vehicle charging stations in the Alaska Interior is on hold, after the Trump administration paused a $5 billion federal program intended to expand clean energy infrastructure earlier this month.
Electric vehicle users in the region, like Kirby Hobley, are feeling the pinch. Hobley often charges his olive green, electric Volvo at one of Fairbanks’ only fast-charging stations located in the Golden Valley Electric Association parking lot. Many electric vehicle — or, EV — users elect to charge up at home, which can take hours. High-voltage fast charging stations, like the one Hobley uses, take less time to juice up the battery. But Hobley has to share that outlet with about 150 other EV users in town.
“I really like my EV, but that the infrastructure is not here for it makes it much more stressful to have it,” he said. “But I don't want to go back to something that just, like, pollutes.”
Hobley’s Volvo still pollutes, since most of the electricity from Fairbanks’ grid comes from fossil fuels. But experts say an EV powered purely by electricity from a coal-fired power plant is more fuel efficient and better for the environment than a car powered by gasoline.
EV demand is growing, but Alaskans in the Interior are feeling around in the dark
Alaska’s demand for EVs is projected to grow at a rate of up to around 60% per year, according to the Alaska Energy Authority. The fleet is mostly concentrated in Anchorage and Juneau, where there’s a lot more infrastructure to support them. But many EV owners in the Interior, like Hobley, are starved for a charge. Compared to gas stations, fast charging stations are scarce on the road system. And reviewers on PlugShare, a mobile app that’s basically Yelp for EV charging stations, say the few that exist between Fairbanks and Anchorage are hard to use — or don’t work at all.
Users describe charging stations that are inaccessible due to snow, or require them to download mobile apps that they can’t open, due to limited cell phone coverage. Hobley said those complaints align with his experience.
“I mean, it's pretty bleak,” he said. “Like, whatever company they have at the Three Bears — their fast chargers don't work. There have been times when I've had to get towed to Anchorage because, otherwise, I would have been sitting there all night.”
A bump in the road for NEVI
There’s a plan to address that problem. The state Energy Authority and the transportation planning organization for Fairbanks want to install almost a hundred EV ports in Fairbanks, and more and up and down the Parks and Richardson highways. The project could have begun as early as this summer, funded with $52 million from the federal National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program — or NEVI.
But on Feb. 6, the Trump administration put NEVI under review, effectively halting all of its new projects. Jackson Fox, who directs Fairbanks’ transportation organization, said the future of the Fairbanks end of the project isn’t clear.
“We're worried about whether or not we'll actually get a federal reimbursement for that work,” he said. “There's a lot of uncertainty, and we are waiting on further direction and guidance from our Federal Highway Division office in Alaska as to the risks moving forward.”
That federal agency could not be reached in time for publication, but a memo addressed to its state offices said it’s updating the program to align with current Department of Transportation priorities. It also said the agency aims to publish a draft of new program guidelines, which will be open for public comment in the spring.
Project stakeholders aren’t throwing in the towel — yet
Tim Leach is the deputy director of LaunchAlaska, a climate tech nonprofit partnering with the statewide EV project, as well as an EV owner himself. He said, despite the uncertainty from the executive orders, this is an important moment to modernize the state.
“A lot of our folks here in Alaska are really interested in self-reliance,” he said. “This is a topic that is near and dear to many, but we need to make sure that we have publicly-available charging infrastructure to enable that consumer choice.”
He said, despite the infrastructure lag, Alaskan EV owners are saving money — he claims he saves around $1,300 on annual fuel costs. And some of them are even running their homes off of their cars.
“There's actually the ability to then send the electrons back through the wires in the other direction,” said Leach. “The benefit that that can bring for folks who are in a remote cabin is that when the grid goes down — and, of course, we have plenty of experience with that this winter — is that you can then use your electric vehicle battery to sustain the loads in your home, or perhaps the loads in your small business.”
With the NEVI funding in question, the Fairbanks charging station project is in limbo. But Jackson Fox is holding onto hope, and looking at other sources of funding.
“I'm using the word ‘pause’ right now because I have hopes that we can get this back on track,” he said. “So, provided we're using a different funding source, we might still be safe to move forward. But, again: we feel some risk.”
The office was looking for places around Fairbanks to host the new chargers, but that’s on pause now, too. The Alaska Energy Authority said in an email that the federal funding freeze also affected progress on its project to put charging stations on the road system, but declined to comment further.
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