Walmart wants to create its own mega EV charging network

Americans, you may wish to know that Walmart has announced plans for its own network of electric vehicle chargers. Yep, the hypermarket chain is turning its attention to hypermiling.

Although presumably it wants you to drive your EV as inefficiently as possible because that way you'll need to charge more often, which in turn would mean more visits to Walmart. Yeah, our little joke didn't work, but you get the picture. 

Anyway, energy transformation boss at Walmart, Vishal Kapadia, explained: "We have the ability to address range and charging anxiety in a way that no one else can in this country.”

That's because if you include the 4,635 branches of Walmart and the 600 branches of Sam’s Club (a membership-based warehouse chain owned by the conglomerate), Walmart has a store within 10 miles of 90 per cent of Americans. Crikey.

And if it stuck a mere ten charge points in per branch, Walmart would have more devices than there are in public in the entirety of the UK. Currently it's aiming for a more realistic target of four chargers per store installed by 2030.

Of course, Walmart does already have almost 1,300 chargepoints at 280 locations as part of a deal with VW’s ‘Electrify America’ campaign. However, it reckons that ownerships of the charge points will help it to manage cost and reliability challenges.