Hawaiian Electric launches online siting tool for electric vehicle charging stations
As a way to aid the deployment of electric vehicle charging stations, Hawaiian Electric this week released the online Electric Vehicle Charger Siting Tool – a color-coded map detailing available capacity across the Hawaiian grid.
Meant for EV service providers, fleet operators and government agencies alike, the tool takes things down to a circuit level, so organizations can consider what they have to work with and where. Potential charger sites are accessible by cursor, or by entering certain locations’ addresses or GPS coordinates on the siting tool, and locations are shaded based on the estimated available capacity on nearby distribution circuits.
“Hawaiian Electric aims to enable charging for Hawaii’s growing number of electric vehicles,” Aki Marceau, Hawaiian Electric’s director of electrification of transportation, said. “One way to catalyze growth is to provide greater transparency about where charging stations could be installed more quickly and cost-effectively.”
While this won’t affect the standard service request and interconnection process, Hawaiian Electric noted the tool should offer interested parties a high-level overview at the beginning of their site selection processes, and give them a better idea of the level of investment required. Areas will be divided into green (with available capacity greater than 1 MW), orange (between 500 kW and 1 MW), and red (less than 500 kW).
By deploying such a map, Hawaiian Electric joined approximately two dozen utilities nationwide undertaking similar measures to support planning and siting of EV charging infrastructure.
