WattEV awarded $40.5 million to build truck charging depots in Northern California and Oregon

WattEV, a provider of charging infrastructure for commercial electric trucks, recently celebrated the opening of a massive public EV charging depot at the Port of Long Beach. Now the company has secured $40.5 million in grants to build two more electric truck stops in Northern California and Oregon.

WattEV has been awarded two separate grants: one for a truck charging depot near Sacramento, and another for a depot in Salem, Oregon.

WattEV has secured a $34-million federal grant through the California Transportation Commission to build and operate an EV charging depot on 100 acres of land immediately south of Sacramento International Airport on Interstate 5.

The charging hub is expected to open in mid- to late-2025 with 15.6 MW of solar power, supplemented by 7.2 MW of grid power supplied by the Sacramento Municipal Utility District. It will have 30 DC fast chargers for passenger vehicles, 90 high-power CCS-1 chargers for medium- and heavy-duty commercial EVs, and 18 megawatt-level chargers for pass-through charging of heavy-duty trucks using the upcoming Megawatt Charging Standard (MCS).

“Sacramento International Airport’s proximity to one of largest goods distribution centers in the state makes this an ideal location to serve California’s Electric Highway,” said Cindy Nichol, Director of the Sacramento County Department of Airports.

“We picked our site in Sacramento because of its strategic location next to the Metro Air Park Logistics Center, where 10 million square feet of warehouse space is planned, and its close proximity to downtown Sacramento,” explained WattEV co-founder and CEO Salim Youssefzadeh. “We not only have the demand for regional distribution in Sacramento County, but we also have existing shippers asking us to transport freight from their logistic centers in the Los Angeles area to distribution centers of retailers in Sacramento.”

WattEV also won $6.5 million from the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality to build a 6-acre EV charging depot in Salem, Oregon, which will be grid-connected in cooperation with Portland General Electric.

Planning for the Salem electric truck stop includes 30 CCS 240 kW chargers and six MCS 1,200 kW chargers. It’s expected to open in 2025 as well.

“These grant awards will allow us to meet our plans to expand our network of electric-truck charging depots from the Mexican border to Portland, Oregon, via Interstate 5,” said Youssefzadeh. “We’re building out the West Coast corridor while also reaching eastward along the I-10 toward Arizona and Texas and, eventually, to the East Coast.”

Source: WattEV