But when consumers will get their hands on a charging adaptor is still up in the air
Owners of GM’s electric vehicles will gain access to 17,800 Tesla Superchargers beginning on Wednesday thanks to a new adaptor, the Detroit automaker said. Although, GM made no mention of shipping out free adaptors to existing customers, a step that both Ford and Rivian took when they first gave consumers access.
The adaptors will open up more than 231,800 public Level 2 and DC fast chargers across North America to GM users. Customers in the U.S. will first be able to buy the $225 adaptors, while Canadian buyers will be able to get them later this fall.
The adaptors will likely help GM curb some consumers’ range anxiety, or the fear that an EV will run out of juice without easy access to a charging station. About half of U.S. adults cited worries about range as a reason to avoid buying an EV, according to a June poll.
“GM’s ongoing efforts to help accelerate the expansion of public charging infrastructure is an integral part of our commitment to an all-electric future,” Wade Sheffer, vice president of GM Energy, said in a statement. “Enabling access to even more publicly available fast chargers represents yet another way GM is focused on further improving the customer experience and making the transition to electric more seamless.”
Despite securing deals to provide charging access to just about every major automaker operating in the U.S., the rollout of Tesla’s plans has been slow.
GM, which was one of the first carmakers to adopt Tesla’s North American Charging System, had expected to finish making its software compatible with Tesla’s in spring, before it was delayed to the fall. And some Ford and Rivian customers are still lacking access to Tesla’s chargers because of a lack of adaptors. In August, Tesla said on social media that it had increased production of a necessary piece of hardware to 8,000 units per week.
Ford has told Mustang Mach-E SUV and F-150 Lightning pickup truck owners that the adaptors were delayed because of “ongoing supply constraints,” while Rivian has said a “challenging supply chain position” led to shortages, The New York Times reported late last month.
Tesla’s charging division has been working on the rebound for months after CEO Elon Musk decided to abruptly lay off thousands of workers to streamline operations. Included in those cuts was Rebecca Tinucci, who led the Supercharging division and attempted to fire less workers than Musk had demanded. In return, he fired almost all of her 500-worker team as “an example,” Electrek reported.
And although some of that team was later rehired, progress adding new chargers has been slow. The Wall Street Journal, citing EVAdoption data, reports that the number of new Supercharger ports opened in May through August fell 28% year-over-year. For the first eight months of the year, the number of new ports fell 11% compared to a year earlier.
“Just to reiterate: Tesla will spend well over $500 [million] expanding our Supercharger network to create thousands of NEW chargers this year,” Musk wrote in a post on X $TWTR (META), the social media platform he owns, in May, as Tesla’s partners were left dazed and confused by the sudden layoffs.
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