Streetlights as EV Chargers: Cheaper, Faster, Fairer

The automotive industry is having its biggest transformation since cars replaced horse-drawn carriages as the primary mode of transportation in the early 20th century.

Electric vehicles (EVs) are leading this change, now accounting for more than 20% of new cars sold worldwide. With that, the EV fleet reached nearly 50 million at the end of 2024.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), 17 million electric cars were sold in 2024, increasing by more than 25% from the previous year. This 3.5 million increase from 2023 is actually more than the total number of electric cars sold in the entire 2020.

In the first half of 2025, global EV sales reached 9.1 million, a 28% increase from the same period last year.

China leads this growth, recording sales of over 11 million electric cars in 2024 and 5.5 million in H1 2025. Growth-wise, EV sales in China increased 32% year-over-year.

However, the sales of EVs in Europe has seen stagnant growth as government subsidies are phased out or reduced in several major markets. While Europe still recorded a 26% increase in electric car sales, reaching about 2 million units in the first half of this year, the growth rate has been rather lacklustre compared to previous years.

In the US and broader North America, EV sales continued to increase but at a slower pace. Regional sales rose just 3% to 0.9 million in H1 2025. In Canada, the market experienced a sharp 23% decline, while Mexico grew 20%. The US market increased 6%.

This comes as the US President Donald Trump signed the “big beautiful bill” into law in July, ending the $7,500 EV tax credit after Sept. 30. The bill has terminated all IRA consumer tax credits for both new and used as well as commercial EVs, which is expected to cause a sharp decline in EV demand in the final quarter of the year.

EV Benefits vs. the Charging-Infrastructure Bottleneck

The transportation sector is one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, accounting for about 15% of total emissions and about 23% of global energy-related CO2 emissions.

EVs, however, do not produce tailpipe emissions. They run on batteries and electric motors instead of gasoline engines. They cost less to fuel, achieve better mileage, and produce fewer emissions than traditional cars, making them a cleaner transportation option.

Notably, the emissions of an EV throughout its life cycle, from raw material extraction to manufacturing, distribution, operation, and disposal, depend on the source of the electricity used to charge it. So, if a geographic region relies heavily on traditional sources of electricity generation, then EVs may not contribute to significant life cycle emissions reduction. 

But if low-polluting energy sources are used for electricity production, then EVs tend to have a life cycle emissions benefit over their traditional counterparts running on diesel or gasoline.

Besides having lower environmental impact, EVs have lower operating costs as they have fewer moving parts than conventional cars, which means reduced need for maintenance and lower long-term running costs. The upfront cost of an EV, however, is often higher than that of a traditional gasoline vehicle.

But as production volume increases and technology matures, the cost is expected to come down in the not-so-distant future. 

A major challenge with electric cars is the lack of a proper charging infrastructure. There is currently a shortage of public charging stations, especially in certain regions, creating a significant barrier to EV adoption.

Another challenge related to charging is that EVs can take a longer time to charge than refueling a gasoline car, although this is being improved by manufacturers. Another concern of EV drivers is the limited driving range on a single charge, which is called range anxiety.

To address the issues with EV charging, Shell recently announced the development of a thermal management fluid for EVs that can speed up battery charging significantly.

Shell is an oil and gas giant that has been diversifying into renewable energy, EV charging infrastructure, biofuels and hydrogen, and advanced battery cooling technologies, which showcase the ongoing shift towards clean energy. It currently has over 70,000 public charge points globally for EVs at retail sites and destinations.

Last month, the company revealed that it has created a fluid, in collaboration with automotive engineering firm RML Group, that “reduces thermal stresses very significantly, allowing much higher cell charging currents to be tolerated.”

It is by maximizing contact with each cell in a battery pack that the non-conductive fluid enables highly efficient heat transfer, thus accelerating charging speeds without risking damage through overheating. The company demonstrated this capability in a 34-kWh battery that achieved a 10-minute charge time.

In a light car with an economy of 10 km/kWh (6.2 miles/kWh), the vehicle can charge at 14 miles/minute (24 km/minute), said the company.

While this is hypothetical, Chinese battery manufacturer CATL has already shown off the second generation of its superfast charging Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) battery, Shenxing Gen 2, which has the capability to add 1.5 miles of range per second of charge. 

In low-temperature environments of sub-10 degrees Celsius, the battery also boasts the ability to go from 5% to 80% charge in just 15 minutes.

Streetlight EV Charging: Low-Cost, Equitable Infrastructure

Given the growing need and adoption of EVs, auto makers, battery tech firms, and charging‐network operators have been actively working to reduce EV charging times. For instance, Stellantis has demonstrated a 77Ah cell with an energy density of 375 Wh/kg that can charge from 15% to 90% in about 18 minutes at room temperature.

Toyota is also working on mass-producing solid-state batteries with charging times under 10 minutes, along with a high range. QuantumScape’s solid-state cells have already passed endurance tests, where they achieved over 1000 charging cycles with still over 95% capacity.

Earlier this year, Chinese automaker BYD announced a new technology, “Super e-Platform”, that can charge up to about 250 miles of range in just 5 minutes, so not much longer than what it takes for a gas tank to fill.

While speedy charging is a big step towards addressing EV limitations, what about the charging infrastructure? Electric car drivers, after all, also need convenient ways to charge their cars. 

And for EVs to be widely adopted and help reduce emissions and pollution from the transport sector, convenient and equitable access to charging infrastructure is essential. 

While public charging infrastructure is growing fast, increasing 30% to above 1.3 million charging points added globally in 2024, challenges remain in terms of grid capacity, high cost, and irregular distribution, among others.

To address the issue of limited charging infrastructure, a team of researchers from Penn State has created a scalable model using the existing framework for cost-effective EV charging.

For low-cost, equitable EV charging options, the new design is developing, analyzing, and evaluating the use of streetlights. 

These light poles are found everywhere in urban settings and offer several notable advantages to conventional chargers, including easier usage due to city ownership, proximity to roadways, minimized cost due to the usage of existing power setups, maximized efficiency through reutilizing existing structures, and potential boosts to the local economy.

To test their framework, the team installed several streetlight charging units in Kansas City, Missouri. 

Published in the Journal of Urban Planning and Development¹, the study found them to be not just more time- and cost-effective than traditional EV charging stations but also more accessible, convenient, and having fewer negative environmental impacts.

According to the study’s co-author Xianbiao “XB” Hu, who is an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering:

“The motivation for this work comes from the fact that many apartment and multi-unit dwelling residents, particularly in urban and downtown areas, lack access to dedicated home EV chargers, since they don’t have the privilege of owning a garage.” 

Hu further noted that the wonderful thing about streetlight poles is that they are “already powered and typically owned by municipalities, making them relatively easy to work with.”

On top of that, they are usually placed near on-street parking and in high-traffic areas, which “makes them well-positioned to serve both local residents and visitors,” added Hu.

For their research, which the U.S. Department of Energy funded, the team partnered with the Kansas City local utilities companies, the non-profit organization Metro Energy Center, and the National Renewable Energy Lab to retrofit existing streetlights to work as EV chargers. 

Next, the team of researchers created a three-pronged framework with a focus on benefits, demand, and feasibility, for others to adopt and develop streetlight EV chargers.

“The scalability was a huge part of what makes this framework important,” said co-author Yang “Chris” Song, currently a data scientist at ElectroTempo, who was a doctoral student at Penn State at the time of the research. “Creating something that works not just in one specific city but that can be adopted by many communities easily is critical for increasing EV use across the country.”

Now, to determine the demand for the EV charger, the researchers first examined factors including traffic volume, points of interest nearby, station density, and land use. The researchers then used all that data to train AI models to make demand predictions.

“We also took into account equity, which here means the proactive engagement with the community to ensure fair and inclusive distribution of the streetlight charging benefits across diverse neighborhoods.”

– Song

Using demand and equity evaluation, the team selected 23 streetlights and installed EV charging stations. 
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Then, over the course of a year, they collected data from stations, which revealed that they were cheaper to install than conventional EV charging ports, as the infrastructure already exists. In the Kansas City pilot, the retrofitted streetlight chargers delivered higher average charging rates than nearby legacy public units in the study area, while still operating at Level-2 power—improving time-to-charge without relying on DC fast hardware.

The reason for the speed could be due to the streetlights drawing power from dedicated municipal electrical lines, said Yuyan “Annie” Pan, a postdoc researcher working with Hu. Also, they face less competition from several vehicles charging at the same time, as is the case with clustered commercial stations.

Streetlight charging stations come with the additional benefit of being environmentally positive as they utilize locations where cars are already parked, thus offering 11.94% gasoline savings and 11.24% more greenhouse gas reductions.

“We found that using streetlights for EV charging offers an innovative and equitable approach to expanding charging infrastructure and promoting sustainable electrification.”

– Pan

The work on streetlight charging stations isn’t done yet. The researchers will now build on their model to use weather information, which is of key importance to EVs, as extreme temperatures can affect battery performance, energy demand, and travel frequency.

Another data point they are looking to incorporate is about socio-economic factors that will specifically help identify communities that have limited EV access or adoption potential to ensure more equitable infrastructure deployment. 

Investing in EV Infrastructure

Elon Musk’s Tesla (TSLA -4.45%) designs, develops, manufactures, and sells fully electric vehicles as well as energy generation and storage systems. The company also operates a large Supercharger network, which gives it an edge amidst the growing competition in the EV market.

The company’s thousands of Superchargers are spread out all over the world, located on major routes for electric car drivers to simply plug in their EVs to a unit and charge automatically. Drivers can check the availability of a Supercharger stall within the Tesla app, where they can also monitor their charge status.

As per Tesla, its Superchargers can add up to 200 miles of range in a matter of 15 minutes. 

Notably, Tesla has opened many Superchargers to non-Tesla EVs via the NACS standard and approved adapters; availability varies by region and vehicle. This week, Japanese automaker Honda announced that EV drivers of its main brand, as well as its Acura, can now also access Tesla’s Supercharging network, as part of the company’s plan to have about 100K DC fast-charging points available to their EV owners by the end of this decade.

Tesla (TSLA -4.45%)

In Q3 2025, Tesla’s Supercharger network delivered 1.8 TWh of energy, saving the equivalent of 842 million liters of gasoline.

The network usage also set a new record this past quarter, averaging 587,000 charging sessions every day worldwide, thanks to the growing global use of it by both Tesla and non-Tesla EVs. With a 31% year-over-year increase, Tesla reported 54 million charging sessions in total. 

During this quarter, the company revealed that it has opened a record 4,000 new Supercharger stalls, marking the largest increase in Tesla’s history as it continues to accelerate its deployments across Asia, Europe, and North America.

This record quarter came as Tesla’s very first 500 kW, fully V4 Supercharger site went live last week. Installed in Redwood City, California, the newer V4 designs, unlike previous upgrades that just swapped out charging posts, also feature brand-new cabinets with each one supporting eight stalls. This doubles the capacity of V3, with lower deployment costs and far more power density.

Besides making advances in its Superchargers, Tesla has also teased a clip featuring a cheaper version of its Model Y SUV, which, according to Bloomberg, will “lack certain features and use less premium materials to offset the loss of the up to $7,500 federal tax credit.” The stripped-down version can help the automaker grow its volume, which has been struggling. 

This comes after the company reported a 7% year-over-year (YoY) increase in its EV deliveries in Q3 after suffering a 13% and 12.4% YoY decline in Q1 and Q2 of this year, respectively. The spike could be due to the expiry of the federal EV tax credit, which also helped rivals like Rivian, which saw a 32% increase.

In the third quarter, Tesla produced over 447,000 vehicles and delivered over 497,000 vehicles. The company also deployed a record 12.5 GWh of energy storage products.

As for the market performance, TSLA shares are currently trading at $440.90, up 8.74% this year so far. 

Less than six months ago, TSLA shares had dropped under $220 along with the rest of the stock market, but since then, they have recovered very well, more than doubling in value. TSLA shares are now inching closer to their all-time high (ATH) of $480 that was hit less than a year ago, in mid-December.

With a market cap of $1.46 trillion, Tesla is the world’s 13th largest asset. The company has an EPS (TTM) of 1.79 and a P/E (TTM) of 246.14.

Latest Tesla (TSLA) Stock News and Developments

Conclusion

With an increasing emphasis on sustainability worldwide, electric vehicles are playing a crucial role in reducing urban pollution and carbon emissions. EV adoption, however, faces major challenges, which can be addressed by not only innovating battery technology but also charging infrastructure. 

Streetlight-based charging could help address these issues and accelerate EV adoption. This approach turns existing streetlights into accessible, affordable charging points. Researchers hope that this practical solution will make clean transportation more accessible to a wider audience.

Click here for the list of top EV stocks.

References

1. Pan, Y., Song, Y., Yang, T., Ding, Y., & Hu, X. (2025). Equitable urban electric vehicle charging: Feasibility and benefits of streetlight charging in Kansas City right-of-way. Journal of Urban Planning and Development, 151(4). Published 23 September 2025. https://doi.org/10.1061/JUPDDM.UPENG-5865 ascelibrary.org+1