Electric Car Charging Station Now Available in Roseville

Officials today (Thursday) at a "plug-in" ceremony" dedicated Ramsey County's first electric vehicle charging station with the iniltial site now open at the parking lot of the Roseville Library, 2180 N. Hamline Ave.

The first "plug-in" user was library patron Andy Rodriguez, who connected up his Chevy Volt at the charging station. 

“With the opening of this station, Ramsey County is charging ahead with the infrastructure to make the use of electric vehicles more convenient and accessible to the general public,” Ramsey County Commissioner Victoria Reinhardt, said in a news statement. “More than one third of all of Minnesota’s air pollution comes from cars and trucks; electric vehicles, with their zero tailpipe emissions, are one part of the solution to our air pollution problems.”

The county also plans to install five other public-access charging ports over the next year, four at the Union Depot in downtown St. Paul and one at the Ramsey County library in Maplewood.

Availability of the Roseville charging port

The county said, "The Roseville charging station is available on a first-come, first-served basis and is not reservable.  Electric vehicle drivers park in the stall, remove the charging cable from a holster, and then plug directly into the vehicle’s charging port. Rates are $3 for up to 3 hours of charging, and $1 per hour after that. 

Drivers can pay either using a contactless credit card, or an access card from ChargePoint, a company that manages a nationwide network of charging stations."

Why Roseville for first charging port?

In a news release, the county said it chose the Roseville Library for the first charging port "because of the high number of visits, and its sustainability features as a certified Leadership in Energy and Environment Design (LEED) Gold building. 

“As Ramsey County’s first building to receive the LEED  “Gold” level certification for sustainable design and construction principles, it’s very fitting that the Roseville Library is also the first County site to have a public access charging station,” Ramsey County Library Board Vice Chair Beverly Aplikowski stated.

The Roseville charging station cost $12,763 to purchase and install, according to the county. The cost was covered by funding from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) through funding originally allocated by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), the county said.

The new public access charging station in Rosville now gives Minnesota 31 such sites currently. That number is  expected to more than triple over the next year largely through federal grant funding supplemented by contributions from other public and private parties, according to the county.