New electric vehicle charging stations are rolling out across the Golden Triangle, including a fast-charging station that’s installation will be underway this week.
Starkville Utilities General Manager Edward Kemp said the new ChargePoint station will be located in the city-owned parking lot near the intersection of Lampkin and Jackson streets. It should be operational by early fall.
“Our new EV charging station is another step into the future as we prepare to serve Starkville’s changing transportation needs,” Kemp said in a Wednesday press release. “It’s all part of our commitment to invest in ongoing infrastructure upgrades that ensure Starkville is a convenient, accessible destination point for all travelers, no matter what mode of transportation they use.”
The project will cost roughly $216,000 and is being funded by a $150,000 grant from the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Fast Charge Network Program, which is intended to install fast-charging stations at 50-mile intervals along interstates and major highways in TVA’s service area, the release said.
The new charging station is also being funded by a $48,000 grant from the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality. The remaining balance of $18,000 is coming from the utility’s capital improvements budget, the release said.
Kemp said the number of electric vehicles on the road is growing, and Starkville Utilities is also supplying electricity to power that demand.
According to the release, around 1.6 million electric vehicles were sold in the United States in 2023, and in the Southeast, new light-duty electric vehicle sales grew 50% from July 2022 to June 2023, representing nearly 470,000 sales.
In 2019, Starkville Utilities installed fast-charging stations downtown behind Hotel Chester and at the Starkville Sportsplex. Kemp told The Dispatch those chargers are “pretty regularly used,” but they are Level 1 chargers, which are slower than the new addition.
The new station downtown will be even faster, Kemp said, accommodating the needs of residents and visitors who need them, like parents of Mississippi State students. It will have the capacity to charge two vehicles at a time, with each charge taking as little as 30 minutes. The new charging station should be compatible with most electric vehicles.
“There’s been a need and a request for some faster charging infrastructure,” Kemp said. “I think it will be very well received by the community and by the visitors.”
The fast-charging station at Lampkin and Jackson streets will be the sixth publicly available charging station in Starkville and the 16th in the Golden Triangle, according to PlugShare, an app that maps charging stations across the nation.
Other mapped stations in Starkville include a J-1772 charger at the Mississippi State Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems. There are also mapped chargers at the Hampton Inn on Highway 12 and the Russell Inn & Suites on Russell Street, though both are marked as being available for hotel patrons only.
Charging in Columbus
Columbus Light and Water installed its first downtown charging station for electric vehicles in 2019, located on Main Street in front of the Tennessee Williams Home and Welcome Center.
CLW General Manager Angela Verdell said the utility provider got a new fast-charging station in March next to the CLW main office on Fifth Street South.
“If there’s only one vehicle there, it’s going to charge faster than if you have two, because the power is going to be split between two,” Verdell said. “Say a Tesla Model 3 needs to get a full charge, you can get that in under an hour. About 45 minutes, you can get a full charge. You can get enough charge to go to your next destination in 20 minutes or less.”
The Tennessee Valley Public Power Association installed the units, she said, while funding for the units came from TVA and the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality.
For the first five years, Verdell said, CLW is under an agreement that all revenue generated by the fast-charging station should go back to the maintenance of that station. Once that agreement ends, CLW will have sole control of the charging station.
Both charging stations, Verdell said, are being “widely used,” with more than 100 charging sessions every month since April and 124 sessions in July.
“We know that people are excited to have charging stations, period,” Verdell said. “Public charging stations. And that’s a kudos to the city of Columbus. But we also know we have people traveling through the city going to other places. This is a stopping point for them. It’s centrally located, and it gives them a nice place to stop, to charge up and to enjoy some of the downtown sights.”
Besides the downtown chargers, PlugShare also lists chargers at car dealerships, including Carl Hogan Chevrolet, Bill Russell Ford Lincoln and Bill Russell Ford on Highway 45 and the Columbus Hyundai and Columbus Nissan dealerships near Highway 12 E.
Chargers are also listed at the Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott Columbus, Courtyard Columbus and the Hampton Inn & Suites Columbus near Highway 82, though these are all listed as being available to hotel patrons only.
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