Network Providers for Electric Vehicle Charging Systems

Existing EV-charging facilities: The County currently owns and operates several hundred Electric Vehicle (EV) chargers including (50) networked EV chargers (77 charging ports) located as identified in Exhibit-A. Short-term planning includes installation of +/- 150 additional charging ports and related electrical infrastructure across (9) County sites (refer to Exhibit-B) to support CARB Advanced Clean Fleet (ACF) mandated municipal vehicle electrification over the next 10 years. Longer-term planning anticipates electrification of thousands of vehicles across all County Departments with the need for access to County and non-County-owned EV-charging resources. Short-term implementation will leverage the SCE Charge Ready Transport (CRT) incentive program for electrical infrastructure across the (9) sites, and plans have been completed to the Conceptual level. The County's current contract for supply of charging equipment, extended-warranty parts & service, and EV network management software service will expire in August 2027 and would be replaced by contract(s) resulting from responses to the contemplated RFP(s). County EV Charging Use Cases: Non-Networked ("dumb") EV chargers: located inside limited-access County facilities for charging municipal vehicles operated by the department occupying the facility. Networked ("smart") EV chargers: located inside or outside limited-access County facilities for optional charging of municipal, or employee or other non-municipal (i.e. general public) vehicles. RFP Proposed Scope of Services : Furnish EV Chargers (EVSE) and make final connections to foundations and electrical infrastructure provided by others for both level-2 and Level-3 (Direct Current Fast Charging (DCFC)) chargers: Include complete charger hardware and applicable accessories (including those for final connections to foundations and for management of charging cables), networking hardware, if any, not supplied by the Network Management Solution Provider, if applicable, & multiple-year parts warranty. Include start-up and commissioning-support of charger equipment with end-to-end integration and testing of all Network features and functions applicable to a particular charger installation. Provide an EV Network Management Solution with bundled EV System Maintenance: EV Network Management Solution: Setup and deployment of a County or 3rd-party cloud hosted software application with connection to existing and/or new County-owned charging stations via broadband or County-IT compliant wired networks, where necessary. The solution shall include commissioning and decommissioning to support the addition to or removal of EV Charging Stations from the Network. Commissioning shall include end-to-end integration and testing of all Network features and functions applicable to a particular charger installation. EV System Maintenance is anticipated to require all labor and extended-warrantyee parts necessary to minimize charging equipment downtime and return out-of-service equipment to operation as quickly as possible. Maintenance service shall include necessary on-site labor and is proposed to be bundled with the Network Solution to facilitate remote monitoring, preventative maintenance and out-of-service dispatch. Maintenance shall also include installation and modifications of network equipment as required to establish and maintain remote connectivity and shall include remote diagnostics and unlimited technical support for County staff administering the EV Charger Network and Maintenance contract. Provide EV Charging as a Service (EVaaS) The intent of a future EVaaS RFP Solicitation would be to identify and select an Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment (EVSE) provider to install, operate, and maintain networked electric vehicle (EV) chargers on a select inventory of County-owned properties for public, workplace, and County Fleet charging. A 10-year exclusive site license on County-owned properties is contemplated, with the awardee (Contractor) providing all services, EVSE, and new infrastructure on a Finance-Design-Build-Own-Operate basis. The future RFP contract is contemplated to include provisions for end-of-term transfer of depreciated electrical and non-electrical infrastructure to County. It is contemplated that EVaaS EVSE would be supplied by dedicated electrical service connections and not metered with other County facilities. Under this model, the EVSE Contractor shall bear all site improvement, installation, operation, and maintenance costs required to install and operate the EVSE. The type and number of EVSE installed at any site shall be at Contractor's commercial discretion. It is contemplated that the Contractor would pay the County the greater of a minimum annual fee to recoup contract management staff costs, or a percentage of gross revenue. This RFI requests Contractor feedback in the form of a list of County property locations at which the Contractor would be willing to enter into an EVaaS license agreement with the County for publicly accessible charging stations, as well as general terms for a site license agreement including length (if different from above) and rent. Proposed sites and site design criteria would be subject to review and approval by the County as part of the RFP process. Sites for EV charger installations are contemplated to include potential publicly accessible charging station locations identified by responses to this RFI, in addition to to-be-determined locations that would be critical for either charging municipal vehicles or enabling equitable charging-access across the County. It is expected that installation of EVSE in historically disadvantaged communities would be required as part of the future EVaaS RFP and that the Contractor would pursue and obtain available related grant funding with County support. County's property locations tentatively available for publicly accessible EV charging stations are shown at this GIS Link.