Quebecers to be billed for electricity used at public charging stations

The Quebec government says it now wants to bill electric car owners using public fast-charging stations according to the amount of electricity consumed.

At present, customers are billed according to the length of the charge.

The government notes that in North America, the industry is trending towards adopting kilowatt-hour pricing, which provides a more transparent, fair and predictable measure of the cost of fast charging.

Hydro-Quebec and its Circuit électrique network are slated to be part of this movement.

As such, the government is proposing to amend the Regulation respecting rates for the use of the public electric vehicle fast-charging service.

In May 2019, the government set the first hourly rate for 50 kilowatts (kW) fast charging stations.

Two and a half years later, it was amended to set, among other things, hourly rates for fast-charging stations according to power level.

Last June, another amendment proposed new hourly rates for fast-charging stations with a capacity of more than 100 kW.

-- This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Nov. 10, 2023.