Despite complaints over the reliability of EV chargers, California regulators have approved Electrify America's latest plan to expand charging infrastructure.

After ripping into Electrify America’s latest public EV charger spending plan for its perceived inadequacies, members of the California Air Resources Board approved it unanimously.

“I want to get the money out,” board member Davina Hurt said.

The air board oversees an $800-million court settlement that requires German carmaker Volkswagen to pay for a fast charger system in California — the effective penalty for VW’s decision to install software in its cars that falsified emissions testing results and hid the fact that its vehicles were spewing more pollution than state law allows.

Thursday’s vote approved the final $200-million tranche, and a plan for spending it.

Already, $600 million has been doled out to pay for 1,093 chargers and EV education and marketing programs.

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    Toward the end of the meeting, board member John Eisenhut asked the staff for lessons learned.

    Air board staffer Jennifer Gress said the first lesson is “it’s really difficult to predict the future.” For example, she said, early on “we didn’t anticipate the need for maintenance and upgrades.”

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