Drivers’ range anxiety and cost of new EV chargers in Amsterdam: a scenario-based optimization approach

ABSTRACT Due to the sharp growth in the adaptation of electric vehicles (EV) in the Netherlands and the objectives of the Dutch Climate Accord is to encourage electric mobility, in the coming decades a substantial number of new EV charging facilities needs to be provided. Efficient planning of EV charging infrastructure is coupled with the notion of range anxiety, which is likely to be severely high in case of soon-to-be EV drivers. This study aims to estimate the cost of developing a new charging infrastructure under five scenarios of range anxiety in Amsterdam East. Employing a Linear Integer Programming optimization model, on the basis of geographic data on car registration, existing EV chargers, and electricity substations, it is obtained that if drivers use 90% of their battery before using a charging facility, the existing charging infrastructure needs to be expanded by only 31% to accommodate almost seven times larger number of EVs – the threshold set by the European Union (EU) legislation on the deployment of alternative fuel infrastructure. If drivers use only 30% of the batteries; however, an increase of 167% in infrastructure is inevitable (accounting for almost five million euro of cost). Second, at any point along the range anxiety spectrum, if the interval between charging session increases for 1 day, the overall cost decreases by more than 30%. These findings are discussed, and two policy approaches are proposed: (1) information technology approach; (2) demand-response approach, on the basis of EU legislation on energy efficiency and deployment of alternative fuel infrastructure.