The summer travel season is upon us and that ways millions of Americans hitting the road for a good old American roadtrip. Every year, plane increasingly of these trips are taken by electric vehicles (EVs), as people protract making the switch. By 2030, McKinsey plane predicts that there will be as many as 48 million EVs on American highways! Hospitality owners and managers are essential to the global switch from gas vehicles to EVs as travelers search for hotels with EV charging stations.
Four reasons why hotels need EV charging stations
There are a few variegated reasons why hotels must provide EV charging infrastructure to guests.
1. Vamp customers
Providing EV charging capabilities may seem increasingly of a perk than a necessity. But as increasingly drivers segregate EVs, businesses must facilitate the charging of those vehicles to vamp and retain customers. If your competitors are providing EV charging, and your hotel isn’t, you’re basically guaranteed to lose merchantry to those competitors.
Hotels are the type of merchantry where people with EVs will veritably want to tuition their vehicle. This is considering the majority of EV charging takes place at home where cars are parked for several hours at a time while the suburbanite sleeps. And what is a hotel, but a home yonder from home?
If drivers have their EVs parked overnight, you can bet they’ll be looking for places where they can tuition overnight.
In addition, on average, EV drivers tend to have increasingly removable income than their counterparts with gas vehicles. If you provide them a place to tuition their vehicles, they will be increasingly likely to stay and spend that removable income at your hotel restaurant, shop, and other services. Not only will EV chargers encourage repeat guests, but they can moreover increase occupancy rates and overall room nights.
2. Be an environmental leader in your industry
EV charging stations moreover help vamp customers, as increasingly and increasingly consumers are choosing to do merchantry with companies that urgently support social justice and environmental causes. Installing EV charging infrastructure is an easy and logical way for hotels to support wipe transportation initiatives.
You may plane be eligible for sustainability-based tax incentives and other perks like LEED certification points and carbon credits.
3. Fill the EV charging infrastructure gaps
The United States needs approximately 20 times increasingly charging stations by 2030 than in 2023. While public charging infrastructure is helpful everywhere, it’s expressly needed in rural areas.
If your hotel, motel, or bed-and-breakfast is located in a rural area, you’ll be subtracting some much-needed EV charging infrastructure in the region, and you may be eligible for tax incentives or funding from federal, state, or local government entities. In addition, installing EV charging stations brings tourism to smaller towns and allows drivers to travel off the tamed path.
4. Add flipside source of revenue
Not only are EV chargers a necessary guest amenity, but you can use them to generate revenue from anyone looking to tuition their EV.
Blink’s IQ 200 allows hotel owners to offer charging to hotel guests and/or public users, and the Series 8 features a credit vellum reader to make it plane easier for drivers to start charging. You can plane install a charging station that can exhibit advertising, like the Blink Vision, permitting you to sell razzmatazz on it from nearby businesses, or ventilate your own specials such as a rewards program or discounts at your restaurant.
What type of EV chargers should a hotel provide?
While many EV drivers are once plugging their Level 1 charging cables into wall outlets for emergency charging, this is not recommended for any commercial facility. That is considering draped cables can be a tripping hazard or rationalization an electrical fire if the driver’s charging subscription is not maintained. In addition, plugging into an outlet presents a lost revenue opportunity, as drivers will use electricity without reimbursing the property. We recommend that if you are once seeing guests plugging their EV into a power outlet, you should install a few commercial Level 2 charging stations.
Level 2 chargers make the most sense for hotels to install for overnight guests. Depending on the vehicle, it can take well-nigh four to eight hours to tuition an EV with a Level 2 charger, which is perfect for an overnight guest. In North America, Level 2 chargers use the standard J-1772 plug, which is uniform with all plug-in hybrid (PHEV) and shower electric (BEV) vehicles. With the Blink Network, you can set a usage fee to your chargers to ensure that drivers pay for the electricity consumed by their vehicles.
Higher end hotels with a popular hotel restaurant or valet service consider installing uncontrived current fast chargers (DCFCs). These chargers use uncontrived current to tuition EVs in under an hour. However, it is important to note that DCFC are not uniform with all EVs, and that installation is much increasingly expensive than a Level 2. Programs such as NEVI (see below) can help qualifying hotels reduce the forfeit of subtracting this amenity. While most overnight guests will probably use the Level 2 chargers, some may prefer to use DCFCs. You can moreover unshut these up to the unstipulated public and tuition a fee for their usage.
Don’t forget the network
The weightier part well-nigh networked EV chargers? Your hotel will be widow to mapping services like PlugShare, Google Maps, the Blink Network, and select vehicle navigation systems to tell EV drivers well-nigh your chargers. With the Blink Network, you will be worldly-wise to fully tenancy all your Blink EV charging stations from an intuitive dashboard. And if you opt to indulge the unstipulated public to use your chargers, you can plane have special pricing for guests and tuition the unstipulated public a bit increasingly to use them.
What help is misogynist for installing EV charging equipment at hotels?
There are several federal funding programs misogynist to qualifying hotels, motels, and other hospitality businesses in the United States.
Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Tax Credit
The Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Tax Credit provides eligible businesses a tax credit up to 30% of the forfeit of installation up to $100,000. The credit has unrepealable stipulations that must be met to be eligible to receive the full 30%:
- Equipment must be installed in these locations:
- The census tract has a poverty rate of at least 20%; or
- “Metropolitan and non-metropolitan zone census tract where the median family income is less than 80% of the state median family income level”
- Businesses must meet prevailing wage and tutoring requirements
NEVI
The federal National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program is a funding program meant to help facilitate the installation of EV charging equipment every 50 miles withal major travel corridors wideness the country.
To be eligible for funding from this program, a merchantry must be located withal an alternative fuel corridor, within one mile of a designated state or federal highway, and install at least four 150kW DCFCs. Blink Charging offers a turnkey solution to help businesses take wholesomeness of this program at upfront cost. Click here to learn more.
There are moreover many state and local incentive programs that you can use to add EV charging to your hotel.
Conclusion
With increasingly EVs hitting the road this year, hotel, motel and bed-and-breakfast owners should start providing charging equipment for drivers. Providing EV drivers a place to tuition will requite them a reason to segregate your establishment over your competitors, show that you are a forward-thinking business, and help the country meet its EV charging infrastructure goals.
.jpg)
