2040 USA Charging Market Value Will Be Between $65 Billion & $145

On Sep 7, 2021

It is unbelievable the number of times I have read the following in comments or on social media: The carmakers or government should build the necessary charging infrastructure. Without it, there will never be a transition to electric driving.

The second part is very true. The first part is BS. The charging infrastructure can be built by normal commercial companies. A charging station is not different from any other shop — it only sells a single product, but that is not unique. It is just a retail outlet that sells electricity to drivers of electric cars. The curbside chargers you see in many cities, at least in Western Europe, are no different from the candy and soda vending machines that are all over schools, workplaces, and shopping malls.

The only reason Tesla started building these stations was because it was a new need. There was nothing of the sort. Nissan did the same in collaboration with third parties.

The task for carmakers is to have the right charging interface and software in their cars. For their part, governments have to cut a lot of red tape. It often takes more than two years before a location is shovel ready. That is holding up the rollout of more charging stations more than anything else.

This year, there are four very interesting charging companies that have gone public or are going public on Wall Street.

ChargePoint via SPAC on NYSE dd. 01-03-2021, valuation of $10.4B (now $6.8B)
EVgo via SPAC on NASDAQ dd. 02-07-2021, valuation $2.6B (now $2.4B)
EVBox via SPAC on NYSE before 31-12-2021
Allego via SPAC on NYSE before 31-12-2021.

Photo by Zach Shahan, CleanTechnica.

Fastned is on the Dutch stock exchange and Ionity is looking for partners to expand to more countries faster. The Tesla Supercharging Network and Electrify America are major players that compete with networks that Shell, Total, and BP are building.

That these companies are looking for more investment clearly shows that they think they have an attractive business for investors. What I have not seen is a clear description of the charging market, just the normal “we’re conquering the world” marketing talk with very creative market prognoses, as if there are no competitors or alternative. The road to profitability is just one step around the corner.

Okay, it is hard to explain that there is a brilliant future ahead of you while currently your losses are bigger than your revenue. This is not stock advice. That is outside my area of expertise, which is charging.

This article is about the future. It’s not about these companies, but about the charging market overall. My main interest is getting everybody behind the wheel of an electric vehicle. For that, adequate charging infrastructure is needed. I don’t know much about the four companies that went or will go public this year. I do have some thoughts about the charging market.

2040 USA Charging Market Value Will Be Between $65 Billion & $145