Most electric vehicle (EV) drivers charge at home because it's cheap and convenient. For travelers, on-street parkers, and people who live in apartments and condos, public charging is increasingly available, especially in workplaces. You might be surprised to learn that there's charging near you that you haven't noticed! There are also lots of incentives to help you install charging at home.
Charging At Home
If you charge your EV at home, you have two options: Level I or Level II charging. (For a review of the different types of charging, please see our Charging Basics page.) For Level I charging, you simply take the cord that comes with the vehicle and plug it into an existing 120-Volt outlet, which adds about 4 miles per hour spent charging. Though this is the slowest type of home charging, it works well for many drivers. If you can charge at home overnight, you can recoup 40 miles of daily driving in 10 hours while you sleep.
If you want to charge faster, you have the option of installing a Level II charging unit, which requires a 240-Volt outlet. Level II charging stations are installed by licensed electricians, and they cost a few hundred dollars at a home improvements store or online, plus the cost of the electrician's time. There are “dumb” chargers, which are essentially just safety equipment, and “smart” chargers, which are WiFi-enabled and allow you to see and schedule charging online. There are also portable Level II chargers, which are simply sophisticated charging cords that you can plug directly into a 240-Volt outlet on one end and the vehicle on the other.
The process and incentives for installing charging differ depending on whether you live in a single-family home or in an apartment or condo.
Charging at Single Family Homes
Incentives
The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) extends, until 2032, the Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Tax Credit. Consumers who purchase an electric charging station can receive a 30% tax credit, up to $1,000. However, to qualify, the equipment must be installed in a location that meets the following census tract requirements, per the IRA (these three bullets are taken directly from this AFDC page):
- The census tract is not an urban area;
- A population census tract where the poverty rate is at least 20%; or
- Metropolitan and non-metropolitan area census tract where the median family income is less than 80% of the state medium family income level.
There is a simple way to see if your location qualifies. To find out if your location is considered rural, go to this website and see if your city or town is listed as urban by the Census Bureau. Those locations categorized as urban are not eligible.
To find out if your location is considered a low-income community, go to this website and type in you address to see if your location is considered qualified or not. Your location must be both a qualified low-income community and not listed as urban to be eligible for this tax credit.
If you are a resident of Massachusetts and get your electricity delivered by a municipally owned utility or Unitil, please check your delivery company’s website for information on their electric vehicle programs. (Unitil customers, you can also email ev@unitil.com.) If you are a customer of National Grid or Eversource, you qualify for different incentives based on your income and location:
- If you are on the utility's low-income electricity rate, you qualify for a rebate of up to $1,000 for in-home infrastructure upgrades and up to $700 for the purchase of a home charger. To qualify, you must enroll in any available managed charging program.
- If you are not on the utility’s low-income electricity rate but live in an environmental justice community, you qualify for a rebate of up to $1,000 for in-home infrastructure upgrades but NO rebate for the purchase of a home charger. To qualify, you must enroll in any available managed charging program.
- If you are neither on the utility’s low-income electricity rate nor live in an environmental justice community, you qualify for a rebate of up to $700 for in-home infrastructure upgrades but NO rebate for the purchase of a home charger. To qualify, you must enroll in any available managed charging program.
To apply for your incentives:
- If you’re a National Grid customer, please visit National Grid's Residential EV Charging Program webpage or email EVnationalgrid@nationalgrid.com.
- If you’re an Eversource customer, please visit Eversource's EV Charging Station program webpage or email EversourceMAEVsupport@clearesult.com.
If you are a resident of Rhode Island, unfortunately, there are not currently any state or utility incentives available to help cover the costs of installing charging. We are doing our best to impress the need to support at-home charging on state officials!
To Get Started
If you're thinking about installing a Level II charging unit at home, it can be tricky to know where to start. We've written a guide to walk you through the process and make it as easy as possible for you to transition from gasoline to electricity. Check it out to get help with...
- Determining your charging needs
- Picking a charging station
- Preparing your home's electrical system for installation
Charging at Apartments & Condos
Incentives
The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) extends until 2032 the Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Tax Credit. To qualify, the equipment must be installed in a location that meets the same requirements as mentioned above (the census tract is not an urban area; is a population census tract where the poverty rate is at least 20%; or is a metropolitan and non-metropolitan area census tract where the median family income is less than 80% of the state medium family income level.) Again, we are still waiting for guidance from the Treasury/Internal Revenue Service on how to determine which census tracts meet these requirements. We will update this page once we know more!
If you, the driver, are the entity installing charging, you can receive a 30% tax credit, up to $1,000.
If instead it’s the property owner/management company installing charging, they will qualify for a commercial version of this tax credit, which, according to the Department of Energy, “a tax credit of 30% of the cost or 6% in the case of property subject to depreciation, not to exceed $100,000. Eligible projects that meet prevailing wage and apprenticeship requirements may be eligible to receive the full 30% tax credit, regardless of depreciation status.”
If you are a resident of Massachusetts and get your electricity delivered by a municipally owned utility or Unitil, please check your delivery company’s website for information on their electric vehicle programs. (Unitil customers, you can also email ev@unitil.com.) If you are a customer of National Grid or Eversource, there are lots of different eligibility requirements depending on the number of units and the location.
If you live in a 2-4 unit building
- If you are on the utility's low-income electricity rate, you qualify for a rebate of up to $2,000 for in-home infrastructure upgrades and up to $700 for the purchase of a home charger. To qualify, you must enroll in any available managed charging program.
- If you are not on the utility’s low-income electricity rate but live in an environmental justice community, you qualify for a rebate of up to $2,000 for in-home infrastructure upgrades but NO rebate for the purchase of a home charger. To qualify, you must enroll in any available managed charging program.
- If you are neither on the utility’s low-income electricity rate nor live in an environmental justice community, you qualify for a rebate of up to $1,400 for in-home infrastructure upgrades but NO rebate for the purchase of a home charger. To qualify, you must enroll in any available managed charging program.
To apply for your incentives in a 2-4 unit building:
- If you’re a National Grid customer, please visit National Grid's Residential EV Charging program website or email EVnationalgrid@nationalgrid.com.
- If you’re an Eversource customer, please visit Eversource's EV Charging Station program webpage or email EversourceMAEVsupport@clearesult.com.
If you live in a 5+ unit building
If you live in a 5+ unit building, the building is considered a commercial rather than a residential installation by National Grid and Eversource. In these cases, it is the property owner or manager who will apply for incentives with the electric utility.
Regardless of location, the electric utility will cover up to 100% of utility-side infrastructure upgrades and up to 100% of customer-side infrastructure upgrades for the installation of Level II or DC Fast charging, though on the customer-side, incentives are capped based on average costs. The incentives for the purchase and installation of the charging station hardware vary depending on location:
- If you live in an area that meets the income requirement of an environmental justice community (neon green, dark green, teal, or dark blue on this map), you qualify for a rebate of up to 100% of the charger costs.
- If you live in an area that does not meet the income requirement of an environmental justice community but does meet one or both of the other two requirements (yellow, light blue, or pink on this map), you qualify for a rebate of up to 75% of the charger costs.
- If you live in an area that does not meet any of the requirements of an environmental justice community (not shaded on this map), you qualify for a rebate of up to 50% of the charger costs.
In all cases, if you choose to install a networked charger, you are eligible for a $480 networking rebate (Up to $120 per year, per port, and pro-rated if less than four years).
A very important note: The Department of Public Utilities requires site hosts in this category to pursue additional third-party funding, such as the state incentives listed below. However, if you receive third party funding, the total will be subtracted from the funding received from the utility. (The federal tax credit does not count as additional third-party funding, however.)
To apply for your incentives in a 5+ unit building:
- If you’re a National Grid customer, please visit National Grid's Commercial and Fleet Electric Vehicle Charging Programs page or email EVnationalgrid@nationalgrid.com.
- If you’re an Eversource customer, please visit Eversource's EV Charging Station program webpage or MAEVCharging@eversource.com/
If you live in a 20+ unit building
If you are the building owner or manager for a multi-unit dwelling with 20+ units and live in National Grid's territory, check out National Grid’s site plan offering that can support you in developing an EV-Ready Site Plan for the infrastructure, EV charging station equipment, and management practices required to provide EV charging to residents. Up to 100% of the cost of the report will be funded by this offering.
Massachusetts State Incentives Too
The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) administers a program called MassEVIP, which offers incentives for the installation of charging for various locations, including multi-unit dwellings (5+ units). The program funds up to 60% of the hardware and installation costs, to a maximum of $50,000 per street address. Funding for this program is available on a first-come, first-served basis.
Again, it is important to note that any funding you receive from MassEVIP will be subtracted from the funding you receive through National Grid, Eversource, or Unitil electric vehicle programs, per the Department of Public Utilities.
Unfortunately, again, if you are a resident of Rhode Island, there are not currently any state or utility incentives available to help cover the costs of installing charging.
To Get Started

A Guide to installing charging at apartments & condos
More and more residential communities are installing charging stations for their residents thanks to incentives offered by state and utility programs. However, if you want to drive an EV and live in an apartment or condo without charging available, it can be challenging to motivate the relevant decision-makers to prioritize EV charging. To add more difficulty to the situation, apartments and condos come in all sorts of shapes, sizes, and parking arrangements, which means there’s no one-size-fits-all solution to install charging if you live in a multi-unit building.
The good news is that you can help put EV charging on the radar of your community, and we have resources to help you. Our guide to installing charging at apartments & condos will prepare you to have an informed conversation with your neighbors, property managers, or condo association so that you can put EV charging on the priority list.
Our guide answers questions like:
- How will users pay for shared charging stations in a lot with unassigned parking?
- Where can you get expert advice on incentives, site design, and other key planning considerations?
Here are three additional resources that can help get you started on the process of installing a home charger.
- One pager – Electric cars are coming. What apartment and condo managers need to know.This one pager explains the benefits of installing EV charging ports for property managers and landlords so that you can start the conversation about EV charging.
- Recording: “The value of installing EV charging.”This webinar is a panel-style conversation with EV charging experts from National Grid and an installation expert from ReVision Energy to help you navigate the process of installation. As a first step to any serious consideration of EV charging for a multi-unit property, we recommend reaching out to your utility company to help you find a qualified vendor and to review what incentives are available.
- How to advocate for EV charging in your community: slideshow. Most people don’t know very much about electric cars, so your neighbors may not be considering buying one or be aware of the benefits that driving on electricity offers. This slideshow will walk you through what you can do to spur action, from education, to planning, to finally – installing EV charging for your building.
Please note that our advice and best practices still may not work for your exact parking situation. You may face significant cost barriers that are not resolved by incentives, or you park on the street, which makes a lot of our advice moot. Green Energy Consumers Alliance is advocating for policy changes that will address these barriers and make charging more accessible for you. In the meantime, you might be able to drive an electric car by relying on the robust and growing network of public charging around you…
Charging on the go

Public Level II Charging
When you are away from home, you can access an increasing number of public charging stations. It’s easy to find these stations with cell phone apps and some new EVs come with these apps right on the dashboard display.
Plus, there are several websites to help you find charging stations near your home or workplace:
You can also ask your employer about workplace charging and encourage them to take advantage of federal and Massachusetts state incentives and programs.

Public DC Fast Charging
45-200 miles per 30 min
This charging option is capable of adding significant range to an EV for road trips or emergencies. DC fast charging speeds varies widely according to differences in ambient temperature, battery state-of-charge, station power, and vehicle model and year.
Most modern EVs can be equipped with DC quick charge capability via an additional charging port on your onboard charger. Some come with a DC Fast Charging port automatically and some require you to purchase a special package. You can compare DC Fast Charging speeds by vehicle model and station power here.
Many drivers are concerned about where EVs can charge other than at home; this issue is especially pressing for those who park on the street, rent, or live in a building where charging is not accessible from a parking spot. The good news is that Massachusetts and Rhode Island have more public stations than most people realize and more are getting built all the time.Since charging stations are often hidden from view, the best way to find them is via smartphone apps. PlugShare and ChargePoint are two of the most popular mapping tools in New England, but review this "Ultimate Guide to Electric Car Charging Networks" from plugincars.com to explore other options.
Below is an interactive map from PlugShare:
Managed Charging
It is becoming more commonplace for electric utility companies to offer smart charging programs to encourage EV drivers to charge at times that are best for the electric grid and most environmentally friendly.
No matter when you charge your electric car, it's a good thing for the environment. Right now, an EV in New England causes emissions that are just one fourth of what you get from burning petroleum-based fuels in a combustion engine. And the emissions are going down each year thanks to state renewable energy mandate. We consumers currently pay a flat retail fee per kilowatt-hour (kWh) of electricity that is already cheaper per mile than driving on gasoline. However, the actual cost to the grid of bringing power to you to charge your car (or your phone, for that matter) varies over time. Costs are high when demand is high: for example, in the winter when lights are on at home and work, or in the summer when ACs are blasting. Conversely, costs are low when demand is low: for example, at 2 am when we’re all asleep on a cool evening. Demand is almost always low on the weekends.
Consequently, we can add to the stack of benefits by charging our EVs at the right times, i.e. when electricity is cheapest and cleanest. “Smart charging” is possible because EVs are not your typical home appliance; their charging time is flexible. For example, running the vacuum at 3 am isn’t feasible, but charging an EV is; they’re parked the majority of the time and power prices are almost always very low when you are asleep!
Many utilities across the country try to encourage “smart” charging behavior by offering discounted rates for off-peak charging or by directly ramping down the power consumed by EVs.
Here's what's available in Massachusetts:
- National Grid Charge Smart: All participants receive a $50 enrollment bonus plus rebates off every kilowatt-hour (kWh) of charging during off-peak hours. From 9pm to 1pm on weekdays, the rebate is $0.03/kWh in non-summer months (Oct.1-May 31) and $0.05/kWh in summer months (Jun. 1-Sep. 30). The rebates will be seen on monthly electric bills.
Rhode Island, unfortunately, does not currently have any off-peak charging incentives.