One of the many arguments against switching from gas and diesel to electric cars has always been a lack of charging infrastructure.
Historically true and still in many areas, this has become less so since the Obama administration due to more charging programs and faster charge times.
The State of Michigan and DTE Energy both have programs to install EV charging systems into private homes, businesses and multifamily buildings, but legal and logistical complications mean that it is much harder to create or access equivalent programs for multifamily apartment buildings or businesses in Ann Arbor – making it hard to decarbonize the vehicles that businesses rely on and the vehicles apartment dwellers usually also need. Until now.
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Andy LaBarre, Executive Vice-President at the Ann Arbor-Ypsilanti Chamber, said that businesses across Washtenaw County have told him that the biggest problem they have faced in trying to install chargers is “understanding what’s available from the city or any governmental entity, and what funding options exist. … I think everybody understands the idea and why it makes sense environmentally and economically, it’s just (unclear where to start.)”
The resolution creating the program sailed through the Ann Arbor City Council’s February 18 meeting. It created the “Commercial and Multifamily Residential Electric Vehicle Charger Program” to grant funds to businesses who need EV chargers, and for apartment complexes with five or more units.
“The intent here is to deal with an underserved segment of our marketplace, which is why we’re focusing [on businesses’] and five plus [unit apartments],” Missy Stults, director of sustainability innovation for the city of Ann Arbor, said in the days after its creation. “It actually is a national problem. Even though nationally these programs exist, there’s really no incentive for a landlord to use their capital to install a charger if the tenant’s not using it. And the tenant’s not going to install it because they’re only going to be there for a period of time, not forever.”
Stults said solving this “incentive problem” took a long series of dialogues between “tenants, landlords and property managers to try and understand what would help overcome that incentive problem. And one simple one was, ‘can you help us navigate the permitting process?’ and ‘can you help us buy the chargers?’ And that’s important to us because we don’t want to have 12 different kinds of chargers or 12 different kinds of apps, in order to charge in Ann Arbor. We want to make it easy. … So we decided we would cover the charging needed on site to help cut through some of the hesitation to [invest in] charging in the marketplace.”
What the program means for businesses and renters
Ann Arbor already has a fair number of EV chargers – through suppliers like Flo, Tesla or Charge Point – but not nearly enough to sustain the whole city. The chargers are also clustered in very specific areas around downtown and major corridors like Washtenaw Avenue and Stadium Boulevard, or Plymouth and Packard Roads.
The program is designed to favor locations that are anywhere other than in the clusters, to help make car charging ubiquitous across every neighborhood, although apartment complexes and businesses in any part of town can apply. You can view where charging locations are throughout Washtenaw County using Plugshare, the same map that the city uses.
“For this program, we have been working with manufacturers to make sure that we have technical specs that actually work for different use cases because business chargers can be a little bit different that home chargers,” Stults said.
The terms and conditions for the program covers nine pages total, which can be viewed online.
This pilot scheme only has a $100,000 budget. Each installation is expected to cost $7,500 to $10,000 to the taxpayer, meaning that no more than 13 chargers can be installed per year under this scheme, but that budget could be enlarged if demand calls for it. Cost differences will be based on site-specific details like location, how difficult the electrical hookup is, and the number of cars that the installed infrastructure will be made chargeable at that site.
“I think it’ll be enough for the moment to demonstrate both to the city’s end, and the demand end, is good and existing, and folks want to make use of it. Eventually they’ll have to scale that up,” LaBarre said. “Market forces will over time tend to drive down the costs of some of the equipment. If you look at a market like solar panels over the last ten, fifteen years, they’ve become drastically more affordable, accessible ,and practically useful. I think that will happen with chargers. The question though is to what degree do you need programs up front like the city’s, and state incentives.”
Using the program
You can also combine this program with existing ones. DTE Energy already has its own multifamily building, municipal, and business orientated charging programs where they offer to cover thousands in charging infrastructure because it helps them along in their own goals to be carbon neutral by mid-century. You can reach out to the utility for clarification on what is available.
“A big part of our programing is offering education and awareness on the benefits of the convergence to clean technology, and so as we work with communities, which also have their own sustainability plans. We also bring awareness on the tangible action items that can be taken – awareness, hard dollars and incentives on the mare ready rebates on the installation of chargers, whether on the residential or commercial side,” Milena Kabashi, DTE Electric’s transportation electrification manager, explained. When combining municipal incentives with DTE’s, Kabashi said that they plan to partner with programs like Ann Arbor’s new charger program “because I think that no one organization can do this alone. … Making it easy for customers, through real or perceived barriers, makes it easier for them to make the switch.”
In total, DTE Energy has installed 9,455 residential home chargers and 1,226 EV rebates so far across their region. As for business, 325 sites with 1,588 total Level 2 Bus ports have taken advantage of their rebate, 42 sites with 89 DCFC units have taken advantage of that rebate and 49 sites with 265 eFleet chargers ports have too.
Charger density throughout DTE’s coverage area is clustering around southern Oakland County, Ann Arbor and western Wayne County according to the report. Their $1,500 EV rebate scheme went from 179 takers in 2023, to 1,047 takers last year. Their $500 home EV charger rebate went from 95 takers in 2019, to 238 in 2020, 575 in 2021, 1,366 in 2022, 2,765 in 2023 and 4,416 last year. All of DTEs’ numbers are spread from as far as Jackson, to the Ohio State line, to the Thumb, unlike Ann Arbor’s program.
Business orientated ports have dipped slightly recently, however. DTE’s Level 2 sites rebate program for businesses went from 6, to 26, to 54, to 89, to 78, to 72 over the same period, and their level 2 port rebate program went from 20, to 117, to 223, to 370, to 471, to 387 last year. Business oriented DC Fast Charger installations may have recovered from their dips in terms of sites from 8 in 2021 and 2022, to 7 in 2023, before rebounding to 15 last year. Similarly, eFleet charger rebates for new locations went from 3 locations in 2022, to 18 in 2023, to 17 in 2024, although the total number of eCharger rebate ports is still down in 2024 compared to 2023. Interestingly, the number of fast chargers for businesses with large fleets of vehicles had their dip in 2022, not 2023 – with six installed at two locations in 2021, two installed at just one location in 2022, five at 2 locations in 2023, and 41 at six locations in 2024.
Other programs also exist. Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed a bill passed by the Michigan Legislature that created $30 million program last summer for disadvantaged communities, to cover up to 40% of the cost for EV charging or hydrogen fuel cell technology.
“If grant funding is received from the city of Ann Arbor, it may be combined with the Clean Fuel & Charging Infrastructure Program. However, any additional funding sources must be disclosed and included in the proposal to ensure the total funding does not exceed project costs,” Nicki Guggemos, a spokesperson for Michigan’s Department of Energy, Great Lakes and Environment, said.
The federal impact
All of the rebound numbers just cover one year remember, so we can’t draw conclusions yet. The effects on total sales from the Trump Administration’s plan to axe EV tax credits are yet to be seen. Reuters, one of the largest journalism firms on Earth, reported last month that eight percent of the 15.9 million cars sold nationwide last year were EVs. Hybrids are now the best selling cars by powertrain type.
“A big thing I don’t know is how do changes on the federal level on environmental and trade mechanics shape the market here. I don’t think anybody knows that at this time, but that’s a massive amount of uncertainty here,” LaBarre says. “I do think that private institutions will want to hop in this market, but the uncertainty is across the board on when and what that will mean.”
The Trump Administration has promised to end subsidies for electric vehicles in favor of internal combustion engines that contribute to climate change and EV sales have been going down somewhat due to a combination of inflation and the fact that many of the most enthusiastic first adapters already have their EVs. But servicing EVs are an increasingly important part of the economy still. EV passenger and hybrid car sales in Southeast Michigan went from 17,400 in 2023 to over 21,800 last year, according to DTE Energy’s fourth quarter of 2024 report on their EV charging efforts.
President Trump has built MAGA’s economic identity on tariffs, which are taxes on imported goods paid by U.S. companies, ultimately raising prices for consumers to encourage domestic purchasing.
Tariffs could impact sales of cars imported from Europe or Japan, but due to the North American Free Trade Agreement (USMCA), cars made in America are often as much Mexican or Canadian as they are American, with parts crossing borders multiple times in assembly.
Trump’s potential 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, if implemented, could impact the viability of American automotive manufacturing, particularly regarding exceptions or reduced rates for American-made cars, while tariffs on chargers could influence the success of charger installation programs.
“There may be an answer. I suspect it is not yet viable. If you just look at things like the cycle of development for the auto industry directly, and extrapolate out from there, it’s really hard to source anything entirely domestically. I don’t see that getting any easier. This notion that tariffs are going to drive up domestic manufacturing – the best I can give to that is ‘maybe.’ There’s not a whole lot of data that shows that is the case, what it tends to do is drive up the cost equation. Over time that may build a domestic industry, but that’s a big if,” LaBarre said. “I don’t think that uncertainty is helping, especially small businesses, figure out this significant capital cost. And [with] federal policy changing, ‘do I want to invest in that right now?’ I think federal uncertainty makes it hard and my guess is that that’s going to play out over the next two to four years. Who knows?”
Participating in the program
The application process for Ann Arbor’s new program is fairly straightforward. Once you fill out the relevant Google Doc form, the city will assess the infrastructure necessity of your location, your building’s qualification as a business or apartment building and geography.
Ann Arbor is planning on beginning installation this spring. The city already had some demand for this program by late February. Although for budgetary reasons, any interested parties must apply by June 30 to qualify for this first round. Whether or not the program continues for its full intended life cycle will depend on how much demand they get.
Applicants should not be under the impression that they would get an exclusive charger. Since the program utilizes taxpayer dollars, every charger legally has to be publicly accessible – in the same way that public or handicapped parking is for any member of the public who needs it and gets their first.
Renters interested in the program can participate. But since renters are living in someone else’s property, renters and the city will need to get their landlord, or company controlling the property, to agree in writing before anything can happen.
Chargers installed through this program will be insured by the city for the first five years of their life cycle. After that, insurance cost will become the responsibility of the user who asked for it to be installed.
Drew Saunders is a freelance business and environmental journalist who grew up just outside of Ann Arbor. He covers local business developments, embraces his foodie side with reviews restaurants, obsesses over Michigan's environmental state, loves movies, and feels spoiled by the music he gets to review for Ann Arbor!
