China ended 2022 with approximately 650,000 public chargers for electric vehicles across its new 37,000 new charging stations, indicating a 10-fold gap with the United States charging network. As for the country’s overall car sales, it sold about 4 million EVs locally, a four-fold advantage from US results, per International Energy Agency.
Remarkably, China’s rapidly growing EV charging network significantly boosted the country’s EV industry, which is just flourishing. With this significant growth in the EV charging network, drivers’ range anxiety has been progressively addressed.
“Aside from the number of products and the competition in China, the fact that people don’t think about where they need to charge … that’s done so much. The anxiety or the doubt is one of the big hurdles that the US automakers need to help buyers overcome.”
Tu Le, Sino Auto Insights’ managing director
China’s potential to lead the world’s EV market is reflected by its massive EV charging network, which also serves as a reminder of the difficulties the US faces.
China’s record-breaking EV charging infrastructure deployment
China has erected hundreds of thousands of EV public chargers annually, significant progress from just less than 30,000 units a decade ago.
Remarkably, China deployed 650,000 public chargers in 2022, per the country’s electric vehicle charging alliance. That figure increased China’s EV charging network to 1.8 million units.
Interestingly, Guangdong alone boasts 383,000 public EV chargers, which is two-fold higher than US’ current numbers.
Public electric car chargers by region: Number of fast charging points since 2015
Not only that, but China also deployed 2.6 million private home chargers in 2022. Nonetheless, the expanding public EV stations in the country is what truly affected EV drivers, given that over 900 million Chinese residents live in urban regions.
Another fascinating fact is that 40% of China’s public charging networks are fast chargers, enabling charge times of at least 20 minutes compared to overnight time with slow chargers.
How has China facilitated widespread EV charging?
National government initiatives
China established the largest EV charging network in the world while leaving the US far behind primarily due to its over-a-decade-old goal to be the leader of the international EV revolution.
The Chinese government has offered EV subsidies since 2010, during the industry’s infancy. The State Council further formulated a strategy in 2015 to deploy EV charging infrastructures enough for 5 million EVs by 2020.
The country also tapped its state-owned firms and public transport system to roll out EV chargers along the highways.
China has also promoted using QR code payment via mobile apps (WeChat & Alipay). It made EV charging more convenient for drivers.
“All those barriers to charging that we have over here in the UK or US, they really are kind of fixed [in China] by the existence of WeChat and Ali Pay.”
Anders Hove, Oxford Institute for Energy Studies’ senior researcher, focused on China
Local government initiatives
These moves influenced the local government to join the EV drive by electrifying their fleets of public buses and taxis, which required the further deployment of EV charging stations.
Furthermore, over 30 Chinese cities offered subsidies for firms that look to invest in the country’s EV charging network, as per Columbia Center on Global Energy Policy’s study.
Another smart move that the US has not yet made was China’s standardization of EV charging plugs. It avoided conflicts for drivers to find a compatible plug for their EVs, which happens in the US.
Private sector initiatives
The Chinese government’s support of EV uptake has also influenced the country’s private sectors. In fact, three private companies dominated the EV charger industry in 2022, led by TELD.
“The more policy certainty there is, then the more confident the private sector is investing in those technologies.”
Marie Rajon Bernard, International Council on Clean Transportation’s associate EV researcher
Gaps to Bridge
China still needs to expand the reach of its EV charging network to boost EV uptake in the country. As of now, the majority of its EV chargers are deployed to affluent eastern cities.
Despite the enormous number of EV chargers deployed in the country, China still needs to increase its number to meet the demand for every EV on the road. IEA 2021’s data suggest that there is only one charger for every 7 EVs in China. Nonetheless, it still has a significant advantage over the US, with only one charger for every 18 EVs.
“Although a large number of public charging stations are being built,” he told Grid, “the pace of construction is not keeping up with sales.”
Shawn Ou, Oak Ridge National Lab’s transportation researcher
