Vancouver Wants to Slap a $10,000 Yearly Fee on Gas Stations without EV Chargers

Vancouver, British Columbia led Canada’s electric vehicle (EV) registrations for much of last summer, and now the city’s planners are considering a yearly fee for gas stations and business owners to help push the rollout of EV charging stations.

Vancouver city hall proposed a policy that could force gas stations and other parking lot owners $10,000 CAD ($7,923 USD) per year if they don’t provide charging stations for EVs, according to a report from The Province.

The fee is expected to help encourage gas station owners to invest in building EV charging stations and to further accelerate the rollout of such EV charging stations across Canada.

In the report, city staff wrote, “There would be an incentive to invest in EV charging to avoid the higher annual license fee.”

The policy would force gas station businesses to have EV charging available in their parking lots by 2025, in order to avoid increased licensing fees.

In Vancouver, it costs $263 for a gas station business license and just $163 for parking lots. Currently, there are only two gas stations out of 66 that offer EV chargers. Clearly, this fee wants to change that.

According to city staff, estimated costs to install charging stations could amount to as much as $136,000 for gas stations and $100,000 for regular parking lots.

At a rate of $10,000 per year under the proposed policy, it would take most businesses seven or eight years to recoup building costs — with cost being a significant barrier cited by most business owners who spoke to the city on the topic.