MONTREAL – Premier Philippe Couillard announced Monday that the province will be pushing its electrification plans further by funding a fast-charge corridor along Highway 20.
Fast-charge stations will be rolled out in two phases along the Montreal – Quebec City portion of the highway and span across six communities.
The premier hopes Quebec will become a major leader in the electrification of vehicles.
“We will keep incentives for people who buy electric vehicles,” he said.
“We have tabled a zero-emission vehicle legislation, the first Canadian province to do so. That’s why we’re deploying the infrastructure network in Quebec.”
There are currently 800 publicly accessible charging stations across the province, the above map displays only the fast-charge stations.
READ MORE: Montreal to install 1,000 electric car charging stations
A standard 240-volt station costs $2.50 per charge or $1 per hour, whereas the fast-charge 400-volt stations costs $10 per hour. To put it into context, a standard station can fully charge a car in three to four hours and the fast-charge can do it in under an hour, depending on the car model.
“Since we announced the plan a few months ago, there has been a 63 percent increase in the uptake of electric vehicles in Quebec, we are now at over 10,000,” Couillard said.
He hopes the steadily increasing numbers will help the province its goal of having 100,000 electric vehicles on the road by 2020.
“The challenge for us will be to answer with the deployment of infrastructure at the same speed as people who want to make the transition.”
Each fast-charging station costs about $60 thousand dollars – the government will assume half of that price tag.
To find out more about electric vehicle infrastructure in Quebec, including where to find stations and how much they cost, visit the Electric Circuit website.
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