City staff planning to replace electric vehicle charging station on Peace Portal

The city of Blaine is planning to replace the electric vehicle charging station on Peace Portal Drive in downtown Blaine.

The current charging station, located on the angled parking side of the street across from Hill’s Chevron, has been inoperable since November last year.

On November 23, around 3 p.m., Blaine police were dispatched to the charging station, where the charging plug had become stuck in the port of a vehicle. Officers were able to separate the car and the nozzle, but damage was caused to both. The charging station was placed out of service and Blaine’s public works department was advised.

In early 2019, city officials had conversations with developer Mike Hill, who expressed interest in installing an entire row of charging stations in downtown Blaine. Officials decided to hold off on replacing the broken charging station in light of Hill’s potential investment.

Several months passed, and Hill ultimately decided not to proceed with his bigger vision. Busy with other projects, and concerned about the high price of superchargers, which charge vehicles in 12 minutes but can cost $50,000 or more per unit, Hill recently withdrew as a possible sponsor of charging stations in downtown Blaine. “I’m just kind of holding back right now,” he said. “I’ve got too much going on.”

After receiving new direction from Blaine city council at the July 8 meeting, Blaine public works director Ravyn Whitewolf is currently engaged in discussions with California-based ChargePoint, which has an advanced network of charging stations across the country.

“They have a program where it’s like a lease, where you pay the maintenance fee, they put it in the ground, they collect money and they take a percentage of it,” she said.

Whitewolf said a new ChargePoint charging unit would offer several advantages over the existing charging station. The existing charging station utilizes old technology and took a long time to charge each electric vehicle, whereas ChargePoint offers quick-charge technology.

In addition, the existing charging station had a donation box that relied on the honor system, whereas ChargePoint operates on a credit system, automatically billing drivers for charging costs. “Because we’re not allowed to make gifts of public funds, we need to replace the old charging station with something that has a way to receive money,” explained Whitewolf.

The city is currently considering the different options available through ChargePoint. One of the options is a charging unit that has two cables, enabling two electric vehicles to charge at the same time. Some options would allow the city to buy the charging unit, while other options would allow the city to simply lease it.

Each option comes with a different price tag, and Whitewolf said the annual cost to the city could be $2,500 or more. “It is an annual amount that we are going to absorb in the city budget,” she said.