## Facts

- Staff of the Public Service Commission of Maryland (Commission) requested that the Commission open an investigation into whether, and how, providers of electric vehicle (EV) charging stations and related services should be regulated.
- Maryland’s Public Utilities Article (PUA) § 7-211(m) required the Commission to establish a pilot program intended to encourage EV charging during off-peak hours.
- In response to the statutory directive and the investigation, Baltimore Gas and Electric Company (BGE) and Potomac Electric Power Company (Pepco) filed EV pilot-program proposals for Commission review.
- The Commission conducted a legislative-style hearing and considered written comments and analysis submitted by interested parties regarding EV charging and the proposed pilots.
- BGE proposed an EV pilot centered on time-of-use (TOU) rates for certain EV owners in BGE’s service territory, with lower prices for electricity used during off-peak periods.
- BGE represented that its TOU pilot would be “revenue neutral,” meaning BGE’s overall revenues would not change and customers, in the aggregate, would not incur additional costs because of the pilot.
- BGE’s service territory included roughly 400 EV owners, though not all EV owners were eligible for service under the proposed TOU rate.
- Pepco proposed three EV-related pilot programs. One program would provide participating EV owners who lacked charging equipment with a Level II charging station and a second meter dedicated to measuring EV charging usage.
- Pepco estimated the total cost of its proposal at approximately $1.1 million, with most costs expected to be recovered from ratepayers through utility rates.
- Pepco’s service territory included roughly 600 EV owners.
- The Commission compared the proposals’ strengths and weaknesses, including their ability to shift charging to off-peak hours and the rate impacts associated with program costs and cost recovery.

## Issues

1. Whether an entity that operates EV charging stations and provides EV charging services should be treated as a regulated “electric company” under the PUA based on that activity alone.
2. Whether the pilot-program designs proposed by BGE and Pepco reasonably advanced § 7-211(m)’s goal of encouraging off-peak EV charging.
3. Whether, and to what extent, pilot-program costs—especially customer-specific equipment costs—could be recovered from all ratepayers rather than only from participating EV owners.

## Decision

- The Commission concluded that third-party EV charging-station providers are not regulated as “electric companies” solely because they operate charging stations and provide EV charging services.
- The Commission approved BGE’s TOU-based EV pilot as a rate-design approach intended to encourage off-peak charging, crediting BGE’s revenue-neutral design.
- The Commission allowed Pepco to proceed with EV pilot activity but did not approve broad ratepayer funding of participant-specific charging equipment as proposed, limiting and/or requiring changes to elements that would shift substantial customer-specific costs to nonparticipating ratepayers.

## Legal Principles

- An entity’s status as an “electric company” depends on the PUA’s statutory definitions and the nature of the service provided; the fact that electricity is used as an input to a service does not, by itself, trigger full utility regulation.
- The Commission may treat EV charging provided by a station operator as a retail charging service to an end user rather than traditional public-utility electric service requiring comprehensive regulation.
- A § 7-211(m) EV pilot should be designed to create clear price signals or other mechanisms that encourage off-peak charging and allow the Commission to evaluate results.
- When pilot costs largely benefit a subset of customers (e.g., dedicated home charging equipment), cost-causation considerations favor assigning those costs to participating customers absent a showing of broader, measurable benefits to other ratepayers.
- In early-stage EV programs, the Commission may approve pilots on a limited and conditional basis to manage uncertainty, control rate impacts, and require reporting sufficient to support later adjustments.

## Conclusion

In *In re Electric Vehicle Charging Stations and Related Services*, the Maryland PSC initiated an investigation into the regulatory treatment of EV charging-station providers and evaluated BGE’s and Pepco’s competing off-peak EV charging pilot proposals required by PUA § 7-211(m). The Commission determined that operating EV chargers does not, by itself, make a provider a regulated electric company, approved BGE’s TOU pilot built around off-peak price signals and revenue neutrality, and constrained Pepco’s equipment-focused proposal to reduce shifting participant-specific costs to nonparticipating ratepayers.


In re Electric Vehicle Charging Stations and Related Services, 2013 WL 4398953 (2013)