Cuts to electric vehicle network funding will mean the US ‘gets left behind’

The Trump administration’s decision to indefinitely freeze billions in federal funding for the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) programme will mean the “United States will be left behind while the rest of the world moves forward,” Earthjustice has said.

Jan Hasselman, senior attorney with Earthjustice, was commenting after the US government cut funding for the NEVI programme, a $5 billion initiative that sought to build electric vehicle charging stations every 50 miles on major corridors across all 50 states.

‘Violated the law’

Earthjustice is one of a coalition of environmental, consumer, and community organisations that are suing the Federal Highway Administration and Department of Transportation in order to restore NEVI funds, suggesting that the government ‘violated the law’ by freezing the funds, which had been agreed by both parties and authorised by Congress.

Joel Levin, executive director of Plug In America, said that the decision to freeze the NEVI programme “stalls adoption [of electric vehicles], shakes consumer confidence, and shuts Americans out of the future of transportation — while other countries race ahead.”

The groups added that several states had already made significant strides forward in terms of EV adoption – in states like Colorado, a quarter of all car sales are zero-emissions – and that the NEVI programme was slated to create around 160,000 jobs.

Infrastructure investment

“Donald Trump is trying to cut jobs, increase pollution, and endanger our health. We refuse to let him,” added Sierra Club executive director Ben Jealous. “NEVI benefits everyone, whether you drive an EV or not, and the only people who benefit from blocking it are Big Oil and auto executives seeking to keep us hooked on fossil fuel-powered cars, while communities in every corner of the country lose out on infrastructure investments in our growing clean energy economy.

“The NEVI Program is working and states are legally entitled to the money allocated to them by Congress. Once again, we are taking the Trump administration to court over its reckless and illegal actions.”

In the May 22 filing, the Sierra Club, Climate Solutions, Earthjustice, NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), Plug In America, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, CleanAIRE NC, the West End Revitalization Association, and the Southern Environmental Law Center sought to join a lawsuit brought by 16 states and the District of Columbia in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. Read more here.