Your electric vehicle (EV) journey may take you on a new route and come with some unexpected speed bumps before hitting the road. But with the right person riding shotgun, getting the keys to an EV can feel like life in the fast lane.

George Thompson is an EV infrastructure and investment manager, and all he wants to do is make it easier at every step of the way for customers to get in the driver’s seat of an electric vehicle.

George is driven to help our customers make the switch to EVs, but we want to know the real story. What was his first car? His last road trip? And a question he seems to get all the time, what exactly does an EV infrastructure and investment manager do? As EVs and charging technology continues to evolve, George is excited about the road ahead.

What we’re trying to do is make it easier for people to adopt electric vehicles.

George Thompson, manager, EV infrastructure and investment

So far, we have 42 Direct Current Fast Charging (DCFC) stations at 22 sites in B.C.’s Southern Interior. This includes higher-powered 100-kilowatt stations on key highways to give you greater range when planning your trips.

As more British Columbians make the switch to EVs, our stations get used more often and deliver more energy through our charging infrastructure. In 2024, our charging stations were used 43 per cent more often than in 2023. It also supplied 696,100 kilowatt hours (kWh) of energy to vehicles compared to 423,700 kWh in 2023. This doesn’t include the energy used at home charging stations—which we have rebates for.

As demand for EV charging and electrification grows, our infrastructure has to grow with it. We’re looking at trends and technology to build a strategy that meets the energy needs of our customers now, and in the future.

George is energized by the people he works with, who all have the same goal of helping customers get into electric vehicles. “If that’s about enabling new charging infrastructure to be brought in that’s owned by FortisBC, I want to help make that process smoother,” he says. George is excited about the EV future. “There’s constantly new makes and models coming online, there’s new chargers being added throughout our service territory, it is only getting easier and easier to own and drive an electric vehicle.”