By: Brian Lips, Senior Project Manager
The National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Program was established in 2021 by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) for the purpose of building out a national network of EV charging stations. The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is administering the program in coordination with the Joint Office of Energy and Transportation. Each state plus DC and Puerto Rico was apportioned a share of the program’s $4.155 billion total budget to build EV charging infrastructure in accordance with the program’s rules.
Federal regulations dictated many of the program requirements to the states, including charging station characteristics, and a requirement for the states to first fully build out charging throughout their designated Alternative Fuel Corridors before installing chargers in other areas. However, much of the procurement process, including the timing of RFPs for building the charging stations was left in the hands of the states. To receive its allocation, each state was required to submit a NEVI Deployment Plan to the Joint Office as well as annual updates to the plan.
In February 2025, the FHWA notified the states that it was reviewing the policies underlying the implementation of the NEVI program, and would be updating its Program Guidance to align with the current Department of Transportation policy and priorities. It aimed to have a draft version of the Program Guidance published in the Spring, but as of June 2025, it is not publicly available. Until such time as the Final Program Guidance is available, FHWA has suspended approval of all state NEVI plans for all fiscal years and informed states that they may not make any new awards under the program. While the NEVI program is frozen in place, states may continue honoring awards they issued prior to FHWA’s February notice. This pause gives us an opportunity to assess NEVI’s impact to date, and the progress the states have made in building out their charging networks.
Status of NEVI Contracting (June 2025)
Twelve states have yet to grant an award. Ten of these states never issued an RFP, while Idaho and Washington issued their first RFPs just before the FHWA announcement was published and are unlikely to issue awards while awaiting further guidance from FHWA. The remaining 38 states plus Puerto Rico and DC have all issued awards through at least one RFP. In some cases, a state’s awards may be conditional or provisional pending final agreement on contracting terms or other factors. The analysis presented here assumes all projects that have been selected through an RFP process are receiving awards. There are also minor gaps in this analysis where complete information is not publicly available.
In November 2024, the Joint Office of Energy and Transportation announced that there were 126 NEVI-funded public charging ports in operation across 31 charging stations in 9 states. Since then, new NEVI-funded charging stations in Michigan, Texas, and Wisconsin have pushed the total to 12 states, 36 NEVI stations, and 148 ports.
Status of NEVI RFPs by State
| State | NEVI Apportionment | RFPs Completed | Funding Awarded | Number of sites | Number of ports |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
It is unclear what the future holds for the NEVI program. To date, states have awarded grants totalling more than $670 million, representing just over 16% of the total allocated by Congress. In May 2025, 17 states filed a complaint with federal courts arguing that the FHWA acted unlawfully in revoking all state NEVI plans and withholding funds. The Government Accountability Office also weighed in on the issue in May, issuing a ruling that the FHWA violated the Impoundment Control Act in withholding funding. This is all happening while the FHWA still has not released its updated program guidance, so it is still not known what outcome they seek. However, if this is the end of the NEVI program, we can still expect the installation of more than 900 additional charging stations and 4,000 charging ports as work is completed on the existing awards.
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