Rampant theft from charging stations is emerging as a new problem in the Biden-Harris administration's push for electric vehicles (EVs), Bloomberg News reported Monday.
Thieves across the country are targeting public EV charging stations to extract the copper from the charging cables and sell them for cash, especially in places like Seattle, Las Vegas and Oakland, Bloomberg News reports. ReportedCharger performance is already unstable trouble As consumers consider making the switch to EVs, executives at major EV charging companies are working on solutions to combat rising theft and vandalism of their equipment.
“This is happening all across the country,” ChargePoint President and CEO Rick Wilmer told Bloomberg News. “These incidents that we've seen are just horrifying in the way they're happening and the frequency with which they're happening.”
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Earlier this year, criminals cut several cables at EV charging stations near ChargePoint's headquarters in Silicon Valley in just one day. Bloomberg News estimates that about 80% of the vandalism it records is due to cord cutting. About 20% of EV charging attempts end in failure, 10% of which are due to cables that are broken or missing completely.
The rise in thefts against EV chargers “has been a top priority for us since the beginning of the year,” Electrify Americas Vice President Anthony Lamkin told Bloomberg News. So far in 2024, the company has seen 215 charging cables damaged, up from 79 during the same period last year.
Copper is valuable, but thieves hoping to make EV vandalism a highly lucrative business would have to carry out large-scale thefts to generate any significant cash, Bloomberg News reports.
“The financial rewards do not justify the risk and effort involved,” Travis Allan, chief legal and public affairs officer at FLO, which oversees a network of EV chargers, told Bloomberg News.
But repairing damaged equipment comes at a cost to the companies that own it: Replacing a cable that charges slower can cost up to $700 apiece, while replacing a type that can charge an EV faster can cost up to $4,000, Bloomberg News reported. Companies dealing with an uptick in theft of their equipment are exploring different strategies to combat the trend, such as using cameras and loudspeakers to scare off would-be thieves.
Sarah Lafalson, executive director of policy at the charging company EVgo, said there's one simple solution that should be pursued. (Related: New California lawsuit accuses big oil companies of lying about plastic recycling)
“Ultimately, we need a much larger law enforcement response to this,” Lafalson told Bloomberg News.
Meanwhile, the Biden-Harris administration Ambitious EV plans aren't moving forward even as criminal activity plagues the industry: Despite spending billions of dollars and issuing aggressive regulations to tilt the U.S. auto market in favor of EVs over the next decade, automakers are hemorrhaging cash on their EV product lines, consumers are still hesitant to switch to EVs, and executives are backing away from near-term production goals.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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