????像家用太陽能電板一樣（它如今已經是美國增長最快的行業之一），電動汽車的發展也即將達到一個臨界點。我們已經從其它清潔能源技術上見識到了，每一次產品換代都會給技術帶來快速改進。從今年秋天開始，第二代電動汽車將會陸續開售，首先與消費者見面的將是新的特斯拉Model X和雪佛蘭Volt。新一代的電動汽車不僅可選車型更多，續航里程也更長。

????如同可再生能源一樣，電動汽車市場要想發展到更高的水平，需要投入巨資建設強大的公共充電站網絡，并創建能夠讓這筆投資獲得回報的新型商業模式。

????一項廣泛共識是，缺乏公共充電設施（包括在工作地點和公寓樓），是阻礙多數人購買電動汽車的一個主要壁壘。基礎設施缺口在很大程度上意味著資金缺口。美國國家科學院最近針對電動汽車發展壁壘的一項研究也表明，很難找到一個有吸引力的私營公司案例“來承擔全部的公共充電基礎設施投資成本。”

????在為充電站建設提供資金方面，電力公司處于一個獨特地位，因為它們能在全網范圍內享受到電動汽車大規模普及帶來的好處，尤其是它還能提高電力公司的固定資產利用率。不過充電站的所有者也面臨一個難題：盡管要想促進電動汽車的銷量和提高消費者對它的信心，就必須建設一個有更多充電站的公用充電網絡，但電動汽車大多時候還是在車主家里完成充電的。不過，如果電力公司提供了激勵，鼓勵車主在非用電高峰時段來公共充電站充電，公司就可以產生超過服務成本的收益，哪怕基于分時電價政策。原因在于，輸電系統和其它固定資產是為了滿足高峰用電而設計的，因此在非高峰時段都處于利用率不足的狀態。

????要想增加電動汽車的數量，就需要一張“安全網”，來減輕車主的“里程焦慮癥”。不過由于車主首選的是在家充電，而不是在公共充電站充電，因而充電站網絡的主要作用是促進電動汽車的普及率，然后吸引車主在非用電高峰時候來公共充電站充電，從而提高固定資產的產能利用率，使電力公司可以獲得更多的凈收入。

????這樣就建立了一種難得的“雙贏”模式，使電動汽車的車主、電力公司和所有電力用戶都能從公共充電站的建設投資中獲益。加州最近的一項研究表明，電力公司從電動汽車大規模商用化過程中可獲得22.6億至81.1億美元的凈收入。這足以推動電力公司投資安裝公共充電設施，然后以較低的分時電價的模式將部分收入返還給顧客。

????Like rooftop solar—now one of America’s fastest growing industries—electric cars are poised to hit their tipping point. As we’ve seen with other clean energy technologies, each product generation brings rapid improvement. Starting this fall, the second generation of electric cars will be arriving at showrooms —starting with the Tesla Model X and Chevy Volt – offering greater range and more model choices.

????As with renewable energy, taking the electric vehicle market to the next level will require big investments in creating a robust network of public charging stations and creating new business models to make such investments worth it.

????It has been widely recognized that the lack of publicly available charging infrastructure – including at workplaces and apartment buildings —is a key barrier to mass adoption of electric vehicles. The infrastructure gap is in large part a “financing gap.” As a recent National Academies of Science study on electric vehicle barriers confirms, it is hard to identify any standalone private sector entities that have an “attractive business case for absorbing the full capital costs of investments in public charging infrastructure.

????Utility companies are in the unique position to finance charging stations because they can capture the grid-wide benefits of large-scale electrification, especially the benefit of greater utilization of fixed assets. However, the conundrum for owners of charging stations is that while a safety net of more stations is needed to drive sales and further reliance of cars using electricity for their fuel, the vast majority of the charging is still likely to happen at home. By creating incentives for home charging to happen duringoff peak hours, utility companies can generaterevenues that exceed their cost of service, even with time-of-use rates.This is because the distribution system and other fixed assets are sized to meet peak loads and thus are underutilized during off-peak hours.

????The problem is how to build EV load, and to do such you need a “safety net” to reduce “range anxiety” which then drives adoption, but because the network is more of a safety net, it will not be the primary location to charge, versus at home. So a network drives EV adoption and load, which then predominately occurs off peak which allows utility to increase their capacity utilization rates of fixed assets, which then allows them to collect more net revenues.

????This creates a rare “win-win” situation where electric vehicle drivers, utilities and all utility customers can benefit from increased investments in electrification. A recentCalifornia study estimated that utility companies could earn $2.26 to $8.11 billion in net revenues from large-scale commercialization of EVs. This is sufficient to allow utilities to invest both in installing charging infrastructure and return some of the revenues to their customers in the form of lower rates.