News
Two more electric vehicle charging stations, these at the Egmont Heritage Centre, have been added to the Sunshine Coast. After being active for only a few days, Maureen Parrott of the Centre reported that their first EV, a Nissan Leaf, used the station while the car owners went for a hike.
Parrot says she found the process to take a lot of time but everyone involved was very helpful. The toal cost for the two stations was $10,000. The province through Plug-In BC and The Community Charging Infrastucture Fund provided around $7000 of the cost. They also had local sponsors who donated time and materials. Capilano Highways donated the pole and anchor for the station, Tom's Signs donated some of the signage costs and the equipment supplier, Sun Country Highway Ltd. donated $500 back to their Heritage Society.
The Centre chose Sun Country to supply the equipment. "They are a Canadian company," said Parrott, "and I found them to be very helpful and easy to deal with." They have also supplied many of the charging station equipment on the Vancouver Island highway.
The Centre also looked at At Energy who manufactures the equipment in Canada. However, their stations are a bit more sophisticated, supplying the charging information for each car and taking payments. The Centre will not be charging for their service and decided that the simple charging station would fill their needs.
There are already a number of public EV charging stations installed on the Coast:
• Olsen Electric in Sechelt
• Cypress Power in Gibsons
• Gibsons Recycling in Gibsons
The SCRD looked at certain criteria to determine the best short term site locations:
- 1. Geographic Distribution.For the Sunshine Coast, getting a minimum level of distribution along the length of the coast is the most important objective. EV owners living on the Sunshine Coast need to have confidence they can reach all parts of the coast from wherever they live. For tourists visiting the coast, the ability to travel its entire length (85 km from Langdale to Egmont) and on to Powell River is important.
- 2. Traffic Volume. The number of vehicles that stop at a site or close to it determines the likelihood that EV owners will be stopping there
- 3. Length of Stay. Since Level 2 chargers require a number of hours to charge, therefore locations where people will stop for several hours are ideal (although some people will charge for a shorter period just to top up). However, this does not necessarily include places where people stop for a full day, since that would limit access to the charging station by multiple users.
- 4. Visibility. In the early years of electric vehicles, an important aspect of charging stations is to raise awareness of EVs and give prospective owners the confidence that there will be charging infrastructure available should they purchase one. Therefore sites should be in visible locations where the public can see them. This is important for tourists as well.
- 5. Locals vs Tourists. Tourism is important for the Sunshine Coast, and there is the potential to attract EV owners to the coast with charging infrastructure. Therefore the value of charging stations to both residents and tourists is important.
The SCRD made a priority list of the 11 sites to be provincially funded. Five of those sites have already been approved through the initial charging station application process. Six additional sites were added to those. Although this list identified the ideal locations, in practise not all owners were interested in having a charging station. Two of the five initial sites declined and one other expressed an interest but was unable to commit at this time. These sites were replaced with others in the Sunshine Coast Electric Vehicle Charging Plan.
The final list of 11 sites is:
- Library / Pool Sechelt 2 District of Sechelt
- Kinnikinnick Park Sechelt 1 District of Sechelt
- Community Centre Upper Gibsons 1 SCRD
- SCRD Office Wilson Creek 1 SCRD
- Additional Sites
- Wheatberries Bakery Upper Gibsons 1 Wheatberries
- Roberts Creek 1 Gumboot
- Trail Bay Mall Sechelt 1 Claytons
- IGA Wilson Creek 1 Branku Holdings
- IGA Pender Harbour 1 Branku Holdings
- Egmont Heritage Centre Egmont EHC
The priority for future sites is as follows:
- Langdale Ferry Terminal. This was identified as one of the most important sites on the coast, with commuters leaving their cars there while going into Vancouver. The site has very high visibility for both residents and tourists. BC Ferries was unable to commit to a site at this time, but is interested.
- Lower Gibsons. No site owners were able to install a charging station. But this is an important location, particularly for tourists. With some redevelopment proposals on the table, it may be possible to incorporate a public charging station at one of those
- Sunnycrest Mall. While there are already two sites in Upper Gibsons, Sunnycrest is the largest mall in the Gibsons area and was identified as a top location. The mall owner is interested but was unable to commit.
- Gibsons Park Plaza. This is another large mall in Upper Gibsons, and is some distance from the sites at the Community Centre and Wheatberries.
- Davis Bay. This was originally one of the District of Sechelt’s sites, but was switched to Kinnikinnick due to issues with ownership and power access. It has high traffic and visibility.
- Tsain-ko Mall. This Sechelt mall is located some distance from the sites at Trail Bay Mall and the Municipal Hall..
- Pender Harbour. With only one station, and located a long distance from the next one, this is the site most likely to experience congestion.
- Howe Sound Pulp & Paper. Although this would not be a public charging station, it has a large number of employees and is located a long distance away. Having a charging station would allow employees to drive EVs to work.