Report: EV charging sessions were up 50% YoY during Thanksgiving week

It’s been a week since the most politically-charged Thanksgiving week in four years, and the results are in: people are buying more EVs, and they’re not afraid to hit the road in their new, battery-powered conveyances. The automotive and EV charging industry analysts report that DC fast charging sessions were up nearly 50% compared to the same week last year.

If you were to look across the Thanksgiving table ask your racist uncle (you know the one) what he thought of EVs, odds are he’d repeat some tired old trope about range, infrastructure, or the grid. As ever, some of his concerns probably were incredibly valid 2-3 years ago, but the real-world data is showing again and again that battery electric cars are ready and able to meet the vast majority of Americans’ everyday driving needs – and now, the data experts at Paren are showing that EVs are ready for road trips, too!

“It is a really positive story,” reports Loren McDonald, chief analyst at Paren. “Despite the narrative from some corners that we aren’t going to have enough chargers, our data shows that the charging infrastructure is keeping pace with the growth in demand and session activity. And reliability is making progress too.”

From the report:

We analyzed data across public fast charging “travel” stations (excluding locations such as dealerships and requiring four or more ports) for Thanksgiving week, Monday through Sunday. Black Friday 2024 saw a 54% increase in charging sessions compared to 2023, while Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving had the lowest year-over-year (YoY) increase in sessions at 39%. The overall average YoY increase for the week was 48%.

PAREN

Despite the growth, there doesn’t seem to be a shortage of chargers or the sort of long wait times that plagued early adopters of EVs years ago. In fact, actual utilization rates declined compared to last year, due to a 50% increase in the number of new fast charging ports and the faster charging speeds possible in newer EVs.

Paren’ analysis also seems to indicate that drivers’ concerns about whether or not they’ll be able to find open, working chargers when they need them — a condition the company calls, “charger anxiety” — may be overblown, if only just.

The company’s proprietary EV charger reliability index was up 3.4% compared to last year, reaching 85.5% and signaling an improving charging experience overall for EV drivers.

The Paren Reliability Index incorporates multiple factors, but is a measure of whether a driver was able to initiate and complete a successful charging session. While many charge point operators (CPOs) claim “uptime” rates meeting or exceeding the 97% National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) minimum requirement, that metric typically only captures whether the charging system was turned on, and not whether a driver was actually able to complete a charging session due to anything ranging from hardware and software issues to broken connectors, cut cables, or payment processing issues.

You can check out Paren’s Thanksgiving data dive in more detail at their site.

Electrek’s Take

I’ve known Loren McDonald for a number of years, and he’s been good enough to work with me in several capacities and smart enough to find me a little annoying. More significantly, though, he is almost always right, and the first person to beat himself up when his projections are off by 1-2% while everyone else’s are off by 10-20.

Earlier this year, the data firm Loren founded, EV Adoption, was acquired by Paren – and both Loren and Paren’s co-founder, Bill Ferro, visited me on Quick Charge to talk about it. I’ve included the episode, above. Enjoy!

SOURCE | IMAGES: Paren.