Walmart Promises Coast-to-Coast Charging

[Drew Dowdell]

Electric vehicle infrastructure news has been booming in the last few weeks and months.  Last week, Choice Hotels announced they would be rolling out EV charging at most of their properties following similar announcements by Marriott and Hilton back in September, in December Pilot / Flying J and General Motors Partnership opened their first 17 High-Speed Charging Locations, and IONNA, a charging network founded by seven auto manufacturers, commenced operations earlier this month.

In a recent press release about store remodels, Walmart announced they would be building a charging network of their own, beginning with 650 stores slated for remodeling in 2024 and another 150 new stores due to be built this year. Walmart's goal is to introduce coast-to-coast charging at thousands of locations across the US over the next five years.  As of April 2023, Walmart has 1,300 fast charging stations at 280 Walmart and Sam's Club locations nationwide.

While the hardware vendor has not been announced, Walmart will own and manage its charging infrastructure, with customers paying for charging sessions through the Walmart app.

In July 2022, Walmart announced that it was purchasing 4,500 Canoo Electric Delivery Vans for its stores.

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[David]

Cool, I do hope they stick with only Fast charging and nothing else. Another money stream for them. 

I wonder how long before Costco finally steps up and installs chargers? 🤔

[Drew Dowdell]

52 minutes ago, David said:

Cool, I do hope they stick with only Fast charging and nothing else. Another money stream for them. 

I wonder how long before Costco finally steps up and installs chargers? 🤔

Yeah, I think all Fast-Charging is the goal.  Besides, they need that for their Canoo delivery vehicles.  I see this announcement as tied to that one. They're not just being altruistic, they want an EV delivery fleet and need to build the network to charge it.  Doing it this way means they'll get tax credits and customers.