The California government has approved a $2.9 billion investment plan to accelerate the realization of the 2025 electric vehicle charging pile and hydrogen refueling station construction target set by the state.

According to the plan approved by the California Energy Commission (CEC) on December 14th, this investment will add 90,000 new electric vehicle charging piles in the whole state, more than double the 80,000 charging piles already installed. California Energy Commission estimates that these investments, combined with funds from public utilities and other projects, are expected to ensure that the state will achieve the goal of deploying 250,000 charging piles by 2025.

California will allocate $1.7 billion to develop the charging infrastructure of medium and heavy-duty zero-emission vehicles, and $900 million to the charging infrastructure of light electric vehicles. The plan also includes $118 million for manufacturing zero-emission vehicles and $90 million for hydrogenation infrastructure.

The agency said this fund will support the deployment of thousands of zero-emission trucks, school buses and buses "to communities most affected by pollution from medium and heavy vehicles".

Compared with 2019, the funding of California Energy Commission's clean transportation plan has increased 30 times, and the latest state budget will spend an additional $2.4 billion in the next four years, which will be used in the next four years. At least 50% of the funds will be used to benefit priority groups.

Last month, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) approved a $2.6 billion supplementary plan for clean transportation incentives, which will be used for consumer vehicle tax rebate and heavy and off-road equipment investment.

These two plans are part of Governor Gavin Newsom's $54 billion California climate commitment. In August this year, California introduced a regulation that all new cars sold in the state must be electric cars or plug-in hybrids by 2035.

At the federal level, the U.S. Department of Transportation approved electric vehicle charging station plans in all 50 states, Washington and Puerto Rico, covering about 75,000 miles of roads. The $1 trillion infrastructure bill provides $5 billion to help states install electric vehicle charging piles along interstate highways within five years. States can now get more than $1.5 billion to help build electric vehicle charging piles. Earlier this year, the White House announced that it had approved 35 of the 50 state plans.