Fast charging grants FAQs

All applicants must have an Australian Business Number (ABN) and be an entity incorporated under the Corporations Act 2001.

Local councils in NSW and Australian state or territory owned corporations are also eligible to apply.

It is recommended all merit criteria are addressed as thoroughly as possible to ensure your site/s have the best chance of being selected for co-funding. Each application will be reviewed and competitively assessed by an independent assessment panel. The decision to award funding will be based on:

• satisfying all eligibility criteria
• competitive analysis of sites across all applications
• the applicant’s ability to address the merit criteria.

Yes, but applicants will need to demonstrate that the charging station:

• is situated proximal to a priority optimal zone listed eligible for funding in round 3
• does not sit within a zone funded under rounds 1 and 2 of the EV fast charging program; and
• meets the objectives of the EV fast charging program.

Please refer to the eligibility requirements in the funding guidelines for further information.

The minimum technical requirements can be found in the round 3 funding guidelines within the eligibility criteria listed on pages 21 to 31. There is no maximum number of charging bays that can be included at a station, and the number of bays proposed forms part of the merit assessment.

A pull through bay is a charging bay big enough to accommodate a longer vehicle or a vehicle towing a trailer or caravan. Bay dimensions must accommodate an EV 5.3 metres in length connected to a caravan or boat trailer of 8 metres in length.

Applicants may request up to $15,000 of additional funding per charging station to construct one or more pull through bays. Applicants may only request $15,000 per charging station regardless of how many pull through bays are proposed.

Dynamic management of charging units refers to the hardware and software systems related to a fast charging station that can optimise charging efficiency, cost effectiveness and grid stability.

Applicants are required to arrange and fund this process, as part of the site development. The distribution network service provider (DNSP) will manage the connection process and provide information on the suitability and viability of the network connection, infrastructure upgrades and overall network connection costs.

There are three electricity DNSPs in NSW, each responsible for a specific geographic region in NSW. They are Ausgrid, Essential Energy and Endeavour Energy.  

The DNSP will advise what work is required for your connection. You will first need to engage a qualified accredited service provider (ASP) who will liaise with the DNSP to complete the relevant work, which will be funded by your project. A list of ASPs is here (NSW ASP list).

No. You will need to demonstrate either the ability to manage these projects or sub-contract this expertise out as part of your bid.

All charging stations must include a dedicated credit card reader per charging bay, per charger, or alternatively, a credit card payment terminal that services all bays at a station. Payment options must not be restricted by any form of business-related prioritisation, such as memberships, subscriptions or smartphone applications.

Yes, you can apply for multiple sites across multiple priority zones within your bid. However, there are co-funding caps across all streams, these are:

• Standard metropolitan stream – 50% of total project value for standard stream stations on average and $300,000 per standard stream station on average
• Fast track stream – 70% of total project value for fast-track stations on average and $450,000 per fast-track station on average
• Regional standard stream – 50% of total project value for standard stream stations on average and $550,000 per regional standard station on average
• Remote regional stream – 80% of total project value for standard stream stations on average and $650,000 per remote regional station on average.

The purpose of the remote regional stream is to provide additional support for EV fast charging infrastructure in remote areas across NSW by lowering power and connection requirements, and increasing co-funding caps.

The remote regional stream targets zones that are situated more than 150kms from significant urban areas (10,000 people or more). These zones are where grid infrastructure may be more constrained.

Yes. All charging stations can be financed by the applicant, their partners or other sources of funding. Charging stations within a bid must have the following percentage of private funding:

• Standard zones: at least 50%
• Fast track zones: at least 30%
• Regional standard zones: at least 50%
• Remote regional zones: at least 20%

Applicants are not permitted to draw on grants offered by Australian Government agencies or other NSW Government agencies to construct charging stations under the program. In-kind support from other Government agencies at a federal, state and local level is permitted.

All charging stations funded under round 3 must be new, greenfield charging stations. Any applications for modifications to existing fast charging stations will be deemed ineligible.

Applicants are welcome to request funding for individual charging stations that exceed the stream specific limit. However, the total funding request for all charging stations included in a bid should not exceed the applicable funding stream limit(s).

The limits are as follows:

• Standard zones: 50% of the total project value on average
• Fast track zones: 70% of the total project value on average
• Regional standard zones: 50% of the total project value on average
• Remote regional zones: 80% of the total project value on average.

Yes. Our funding contribution for each charging station can contribute to the purchase and installation costs for on-site batteries or renewable energy generation infrastructure. This contribution can be pooled across a bid and used for a battery / renewable energy generator(s) on one or multiple charging stations across a bid. The inclusion of this infrastructure is encouraged and will increase the merit of an application.

Once a charge point operator has completed the construction of a charging station, they must ensure that every charger at each station achieves a minimum uptime of 98% each month for at least 50% of all plugs on site. Service outages caused by vandalism or force majeure events are excluded from uptime calculations. This requirement will be documented in the funding agreement signed by each grantee.

NSW Government may require successful grantees to report uptime and charger availability through a third-party service provider.

Applicants must include detail on all sites they hope to receive co-funding for, including their ability to develop, finance and operate charging stations to the specifications and eligibility criteria outlined in the guidelines.

These will be reviewed by an independent assessment panel on a merit basis. Recommendations from the assessment panel will then be considered by Departmental executive for approval.

NSW Government has engaged an external probity advisory firm, O’Connor Marsden & Associates Pty Ltd, to ensure the process is fair to all applicants and there is no bias in the assessment of charging stations and overall bids. Please email [email protected] with any questions about this process.

When the round closes for applications the Department and its independent assessors will assess all compliant applications over a 9 week period. All applicants will be notified whether they are successful or not once the Department has made a decision to award funding. This timeframe may change at NSW Government’s discretion.

No. Stations must be operational within 2 years from the signing of a funding agreement with the department. Approved fast-track stations must be operational within 18 months from the signing of the funding agreement.

It is expected that only one station per zone will be selected to receive co-funding in this round. If there are multiple bids for co-funding to install and operate fast charging stations within the same zone, only the highest scoring applicant will be successful. However, it is at the discretion of the department to fund more than one applicant per zone dependant on multiple need-based factors.

Please contact the SmartyGrants help desk at [email protected] if you experience technical issues with the grant platform. The help desk team are available during AEST business hours.

EV technical advice or grant questions can be submitted by email to [email protected]. We will endeavour to resolve these enquiries within 3 business days.

We will host an information session within one month of the round opening. This session will be recorded and made available online for the duration of the round.  

Following the information session, additional questions can be directed to [email protected].

You can also sign up to our EV mailing list to be one of the first to know about future round information sessions.

NSW Government has legal obligations under the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 (NSW) in relation to the collection, storage, access, use and disclosure of personal information.

When collecting your personal information, we will provide you with a privacy statement at the time of collection that details how this information will be managed in accordance with privacy law.

Information of a confidential nature provided as part of or in connection with any bid, will be treated as commercial-in-confidence and only disclosed with the consent of the applicant.

However, commercial-in-confidence information may be disclosed:

• to the minister/the minister’s Office
• to department staff
• to relevant parties for auditing and review purposes
• where authorised or required by law to be disclosed.

The CPOs that apply for a copy of the list will be required to first complete a declaration and be registered in the application system. Then, a background screening of the organisation will be conducted before we share a private link of the list with the CPO.

Charge point operators may request the site host list by emailing the department on [email protected]. The program team will assess the request and check whether the requester has an active grant application in the GMS and is a bona fide charge point operator or prospective charge point operator. If the request is successful, a secure link containing the site host list will be shared with the person who requested it.