Sault Ste. Marie's adoption of electric vehicles going slow

Sault Ste. Marie resident Kara Flannigan has been impressed with the energy savings she’s experienced ever since acquiring a Mitsubishi electric hybrid vehicle in 2018. 

Zero-emission vehicles are beginning to trend upward across the country. Data from Statistics Canada shows that just over 24,000 zero-emission vehicles, which include both battery and hybrid electric vehicles, were sold in the second quarter of 2021 alone - an 89 per cent increase over the same period last year.  

And in Norway, there’s been talk of having only electric vehicles for sale as early as April 2022 as it moves away from internal combustion-powered vehicles altogether. 

“It’s fantastic, because most of my driving is in town,” said Flannigan. “The odd time I do make a long trip, but the bulk of my car trips are right here in town, so I’m pretty much driving on full electric for the day.”

“I have an app that monitors what my gas consumption is compared to my previous vehicle, and my gas consumption is half.” 

Flannigan says that her next vehicle will be a ‘full-on’ electric vehicle. 

"There’s been so many advancements just in the last three years - for example, many of the small SUVs that are coming out have a range between 300-480 kilometres, which for northern Ontario, with the distances that we have to drive, that’s fantastic,” she said. “Another thing that has developed is the rapid charger. Petro-Canada and others have rolled out charging stations along the highways, so there’s a lot more accessibility to charging while you’re on a trip.”

Slow adoption of electric vehicles in the Sault leads to less infrastructure concerns: PUC president and CEO 

More and more charging stations are beginning to pop up in locations across Sault Ste. Marie.

According to the City of Sault Ste. Marie website, there are currently 13 charging stations around town. 

But overall, PUC Services Inc. President and Chief Executive Officer Rob Brewer says the Sault has been slower than other regions in the country when it comes to adopting the electric vehicle (EV) as a primary mode of transportation.  

And that has at least delayed any serious discussions around beefing up the infrastructure in order to accommodate the energy requirements of EVs locally. 

“That would require significant investments into your distribution infrastructure to accommodate the extra load,” said Brewer. “The other option is to create avenues where we can spread that load out over an extended period of time, and it will limit the amount of infrastructure upgrades that need to happen, which is a way that you try to keep your distribution rates lower.”

Brewer says that an average residential house in Sault Ste. Marie uses about 800 kilowatt hours per month. Then, If you look at the more recent generation of electric vehicles, the average battery size is roughly 100 kilowatt hours. 

Filling up a battery for an electric vehicle, he says, is the equivalent to one-eighth of a house’s consumption for a month.

“It can be very significant. And then when you add to that, that it will tend to happen at similar times,” said Brewer. “Time of use pricing in Ontario is such that at seven o’clock at night, we move into the lowest-price power.”

“And so the thought is, is that as more and more electric vehicle charging happens, it will tend to happen shortly after seven o’clock when the rates go down. And so from our end what we’ve been trying to position is the ability to understand and potentially manage that load throughout the night, so that it doesn’t need to all happen between seven and 10 o’clock at night - it could happen prior to people leaving to go to work the next day, and so we’ve got a lot of time we can spread it over, and we’re looking to see ways that we can manage that load that way.”

Brewer says PUC is currently planning for an influx of electric vehicles, as manufacturers are indicating that large portions of their fleets are going to move toward electric vehicles.

The move toward electric vehicles in Canada

Brian Kingston is president of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers Association (CVMA), which represents Ford, GM and Stellantis. The three automakers have more recently announced more than $6 billion in new investment into Canada, with $4 billion of that investment earmarked for EV production.

The investment in EV assembly from the three automakers is expected to create around 3,500 direct jobs and tens of thousands of indirect jobs throughout the supply chain, which includes the critical mineral supply chain required for EV battery production. 

“This is all part of a shift that’s taking place globally to electric vehicles, including here in Canada, where the federal government has set a target of reaching 100 per cent zero-emission light-duty sales by 2035,” said Kingston. “So automakers are making major investments into both their manufacturing footprints as well as into technology to bring more and more of these vehicles to market and help us get to that target.”  

Barriers to buying electric need to come down, says automaker advocate 

In surveying Canadian consumers about electric vehicles, CVMA found that a couple barriers were raised - the current price of EVs and questions around charging, such as access and range. 

“If we’re going to get from currently four per cent of vehicles of new vehicle sales that are electric to 100 per cent in 14 years, which is a very aggressive timeline, we’re going to have to help alleviate those concerns for consumers,” Kingston said. 

The federal government offers incentives through its iZEV Program, which offers point-of-sale incentives - ranging from $2,500 to $5,000 - for consumers who buy or lease a zero-emission vehicle. 

“That’s encouraging, that’s very helpful - but we’re going to need to do more. The Americans are now considering an incentive of $12,500 USD. Ours isn’t even close,” said Kingston. “So, if we want more Canadians to make the switch quickly to electric, we need a federal incentive that applies to more vehicles and that’s more attractive to help Canadians make the switch to electric.” 

In its re-election platform, the Liberal government pledged to shell out an additional $700 million to add 50,000 new electric vehicle chargers and hydrogen stations to Canada’s network. 

Currently, there are just over 6,300 charging stations across the country. Kingston says there’s still a long way to go in that respect. 

“Canada has a massive road network, Canadians live in colder climates, which have an impact on battery longevity. And many Canadians live in apartment buildings or condos, where charging in the parking lot can be a challenge,” said Kingston. “So we’ve got to get ahead of this - we’ve got to build this infrastructure, we’ve got to have a plan to build infrastructure as the EV adoption increases - because the last thing you want is someone purchasing an EV, finding it inconvenient and then wanting to go back to a gas-powered vehicle. 

“We need to make this a smooth process for all Canadians.”

Flannigan, meanwhile, would like to see more public charging stations for EVs here in the Sault. 

“I think that would be fantastic as far as tourism, as far as reducing our carbon emissions, because most of our carbon emissions are from transportation. But if we built free charging stations, that would encourage people to consider buying an electric car and coming here if they have an electric car,” she said. 

Brewer says that electric charging stations are not posing any issues for PUC right now, as home charging stations are more common. But eventually, he says, the local utility will see chargers significantly increase the load coming out of some neighbourhoods.

“We’re really actively working on this to ensure that we can meet the demand that we’re expecting, but doing it in a way that’s really responsible and we’re not going to end up with impacts to our existing ratepayers. So we look at this as an opportunity for the city to become significantly greener,” he said.