Abstract Manager

Electrification of light-duty vehicles is a critical pathway for reducing community-wide transportation emissions, particularly in jurisdictions such as British Columbia, where light-duty vehicles account for approximately 37% of transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions. While urban centres in B.C. have emerged as national leaders in electric vehicle (EV) adoption and infrastructure planning, many semi-urban and rural regions have faced persistent barriers due to fragmented population centres and long, unelectrified highway corridors. This challenges light-duty electrification as a decarbonization pathway as it leads to dispersed travel demand, long inter-community distances, and limited corridor-level charging coverage.

Responding to this challenge, Community Energy Association (CEA) led a series of projects to design and implement regional EV charging networks. The objective of this work is to enable reliable, region-wide EV travel outside major urban centres by treating charging infrastructure as a coordinated transportation network rather than a series of isolated municipal assets. From 2018 to 2024, CEA facilitated a regionally coordinated planning and implementation approach, enabling the electrification of over 6,500 kilometres of provincial highway corridors. Through the development of three regional EV charging networks — Accelerate Kootenays, Mid-Island, and Charge North — this work prioritized corridor continuity, network redundancy, and strategic charger siting to improve system reliability and user confidence for inter-regional travel.

The methodology combined corridor-based charging gap analysis, regionally consistent site selection criteria, and multi-agency coordination involving local governments, utilities, Indigenous partners, funding agencies, and charging providers. Planning emphasized corridor continuity, redundancy, and integration with existing transportation and electrical infrastructure to support system reliability and long-distance travel.

As a result, these networks now connect semi-urban and rural regions to major population centres and have powered over one million kilometres of electrified travel to date, supporting accelerated EV adoption across large geographic areas on an unprecedented timeline. Key lessons will be shared for transportation agencies on regional EV network planning, governance models, and system-level decision-making, demonstrating how a coordinated, corridor-focused approach can advance transportation decarbonization objectives on ambitious timelines, creating a united and strong transportation network for Canada.