Tesla pullback puts onus on other firms to build electric vehicle chargers

Jack Ewing & Ivan Penn

Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla, blindsided competitors, suppliers and his own employees this week by reversing course on his aggressive push to build electric vehicle chargers in the United States, a major priority of the Biden administration.
 

Musk’s decision to lay off the 500-member team responsible for installing charging stations, and to sharply slow investment in new stations, baffled the industry and raised doubts about whether the number of public chargers would grow fast enough to keep pace with sales of battery-powered cars. It put the onus on other charging companies, raising questions about whether they can build fast enough to address a shortage that appears to be discouraging some people from buying electric cars.
 

 

As the owner of the largest charging network in the United States, Tesla has a powerful effect on people’s views of electric cars.
 

“There is certainly a psychological component,” said Robert Zabors, a senior partner at Roland Berger, a consulting firm. “Availability and reliability are critical to overall EV adoption.”
 

Tesla’s change of direction, only days after it had told shareholders in a securities filing that it would “rapidly” expand its charging network, which it calls Supercharger, is likely to delay construction of fast chargers, which are concentrated along the two coasts and in parts of Texas. Wildflower, a New York real estate developer, was on the verge of signing a lease with Tesla to build a charging center near the intersection of Interstates 278 and 495 in Queens. Then Adam Gordon, the firm’s managing partner, got a text message from the Tesla executive he had been working with.
 

“‘Hey, I was fired at 4 a.m. and my boss was fired too,’” the Tesla manager said, according to Mr. Gordon. “That was the only communication we got from Tesla,” he added.
 

Another charging company is likely to take over the site, which has a permit to obtain power, Mr. Gordon said. But Tesla’s withdrawal will inevitably delay the project.
 

No other company has as much experience and expertise as Tesla in installing charging stations, which range from a handful of plugs in the corner of parking lots to dozens of them at dedicated sites, often along highways.

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