North Carolina Solicited 16 NEVI Fast-Charging Sites. It Conditionally Awarded 14.

North Carolina solicited 16 locations for its second round of National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure fast-charging funding. Its Sept. 11 award page lists 14 conditional awards instead.¹²³

The N.C. Department of Transportation says those Round 2 awards remain conditional until contracts are signed by all parties.¹ The NCDOT public records reviewed for this story — the current awards page, the March solicitation announcement and the June procurement-resources page — do not explain why the award list contains 14 locations after a 16-location solicitation.¹²³ That gap does not establish that two sites were cancelled, rejected or withdrawn.

NCDOT states that the 14 Round 2 awards total $14,405,524.¹ The same current page says five Round 1 charging stations are being constructed, giving the program a visible construction milestone at the same time the next group of sites remains at the conditional-award stage.¹

Where the 14 conditional Round 2 awards are

NCDOT's Sept. 11 award table lists the following Round 2 locations, applicants and award amounts.¹

City	Applicant	Listed award
Jacksonville	Lightning Grown LLC	$906,000
Chocowinity	PowerUp LLC	$1,792,353
Weaverville	Walid and Sahar Fakhoury	$696,600
Columbus	GPM Southeast LLC	$368,000
Raleigh	Charged EV Raleigh LLC	$671,749
Williamston	Universal EV LLC	$951,032
Plymouth	PowerUp LLC	$1,672,805
Kinston	Lightning Grown LLC	$906,000
Rockingham	Triledo Investment LLC	$672,600
Asheboro	Lightning Grown LLC	$906,000
High Point	GPM Empire	$368,900
Wadesboro	PowerUp LLC	$1,825,497
Laurinburg	Universal EV LLC	$952,624
Whiteville	PowerUp LLC	$1,714,465

Those line items add up to $14,404,625, which is $899 less than NCDOT's stated Round 2 total of $14,405,524.¹ The current page does not reconcile the difference, so the two figures should not be treated as interchangeable.

Round 1 shows why the program stage matters

North Carolina's first NEVI round illustrates why an award count is not the same thing as a construction count.

NCDOT announced nine conditional Round 1 awards in September 2024.⁴ A later NCDOT climate-strategy report says six Round 1 agreements had been executed and Notices to Proceed had been issued by July 2025.⁵ The Sept. 11, 2026 awards page now says five Round 1 sites are being constructed, in Elizabeth City, Warsaw, Candor, Jonesville and Leland.¹

Those are three different dated stages: conditional award, executed agreement/Notice to Proceed, and active construction. The public records used here do not establish that the difference between nine, six and five represents four cancellations, one failed contract or any other specific disposition.¹⁴⁵

The same distinction applies to Round 2. The 14 newly listed locations are not 14 open charging stations, and the award page does not give Round 2 construction-start or opening dates.¹

This follows North Carolina's earlier NEVI reset

NCDOT had already changed the scale of this corridor round before the March solicitation. In January, the agency reduced its planned additional corridor locations from 41 to 16 after revised federal guidance gave states greater flexibility in where to place NEVI-funded infrastructure.⁶ NCDOT said that change would let it direct more funding toward communities, rural areas and other locations with less charging coverage.⁶

That January decision explains the earlier 41-to-16 planning change. It does not explain the later 16-to-14 award count.

NCDOT also says its NEVI program can reimburse private companies for up to 80% of construction and operating costs over five years.⁶ The individual Round 2 award amounts therefore should not be read as the full cost of each charging project.

The next procurement milestone for the 14 Round 2 locations is contract execution. Until then, NCDOT's own page continues to label the awards conditional, and the reviewed public record does not establish when those sites will begin construction or open.¹

Sources

Footnotes

1. Round 1 and Round 2 Awards — N.C. Department of Transportation, updated Sept. 11, 2026. https://www.ncdot.gov/initiatives-policies/environmental/climate-change/NEVI/Pages/nevi-awards.aspx Current primary program record for the 14 Round 2 conditional awards, NCDOT's stated aggregate, listed applicants/cities/amounts, conditional-contract language and five Round 1 construction sites. The page does not explain the 16-versus-14 difference or reconcile its aggregate with the displayed line items. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹

2. Applications Open for Second Wave of EV Charging Stations Along Major N.C. Highways — N.C. Department of Transportation, March 27, 2026. https://www.ncdot.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/2026/2026-03-27-applications-open-second-wave-ev-charging-stations.aspx Primary announcement establishing that the Round 2 solicitation covered 16 charging-station locations. ↩ ↩²

3. NEVI RFP Resources for Applicants — N.C. Department of Transportation, updated June 25, 2026. https://www.ncdot.gov/initiatives-policies/environmental/climate-change/NEVI/Pages/nevi-rfp-resources-applicants.aspx Primary procurement resource establishing 16 proposed Round 2 clusters and one station per cluster at the solicitation stage. ↩ ↩²

4. Governor Cooper Announces First Awards for Electric Vehicle Charging Station Program — N.C. Department of Transportation / Office of Governor Roy Cooper, Sept. 11, 2024. https://www.ncdot.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/2024/2024-09-11-cooper-announces-first-awards-electric-vehicle-charging-program.aspx Primary historical source for the nine original conditional Round 1 awards. ↩ ↩²

5. 2025 NCDOT Climate Strategy Report — section 1.3.1, EV Infrastructure Deployment Plan — N.C. Department of Transportation. https://www.ncdot.gov/initiatives-policies/Transportation/transportation-resilience/Documents/2025-climate-strategy-report.pdf Primary state report for the historical Round 1 progression, including six executed agreements and Notices to Proceed in July 2025. ↩ ↩²

6. State Shifting NEVI Strategy to Put EV Charging Stations Where Needed Most — N.C. Department of Transportation, Jan. 27, 2026. https://www.ncdot.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/2026/2026-01-27-ncdot-nevi-ev-charging-stations.aspx Primary source for the earlier 41-to-16 corridor-site planning change, NCDOT's stated rationale and its description of the reimbursement model. ↩ ↩² ↩³