Goal of 97% Uptime
The Maryland Public Service Commission approved a limited EV pilot program in January 2019. Since then Delmarva Power and Light has built public EV charging stations at 42 locations across their service territory. The expectation, much like with their residential and commercial electricity services, was that Delmarva’s electric vehicle charging stations would uphold high standards of reliability. The goal is to maintain at least 97 percent uptime for each charging port (plug) in the pilot program utilities’ public charging networks. This means that each plug must be available and operational 97 percent of the time on an annual basis.
Percentage of Ports Up on 09-22-2024
- L2: 66% (74 of 112)
- DCFC: 69% (9 of 13)
66% Overall Up on 09-22-2024
This post is to document the results of a virtual “charger audit” conducted on September 22, 2024. This audit involved reviewing the online status of each of the 125 charging station ports in Delmarva’s EVsmart network using the ChargeHub and Shell Recharge apps. At the time of the query, 66 percent of all ports were reporting to be online, in use or available for use. 66% is far short of the 97% average annual uptime required to meet EV charger reliability goals.
This level of unreliability presents a significant hurdle to Maryland’s electric vehicle adoption goals, as it undermines public confidence in the charging infrastructure critical for widespread EV adoption.
Distressingly, 11 Delmarva charging sites are completely offline, with none of the chargers working at those locations. If you’re planning a trip to the eastern shore of Maryland, be sure to check ahead before relying on these stations.
List of Delmarva EV Charging Ports that Show Offline on September 22, 2024
Stay tuned for updates and reports on these and other charging networks in Maryland. Hopefully, these will be repaired soon and the map will display more “All Online” green markers.
