The federal tax credit that helped offset the cost of installing EV charging equipment is gone. The Section 30C Alternative Fuel Vehicle Refueling Property Credit expired on June 30, 2026. Property placed in service after that date does not qualify, and no extension has been enacted.

The credit had been scheduled to run through December 31, 2032 under the Inflation Reduction Act. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law on July 4, 2025, moved the termination date forward to June 30, 2026, removing roughly six and a half years of planning runway from anyone who had been working to the original schedule.

This page is kept as a record of what the credit covered, because its terms were widely misstated while it was live, and because an EV charging project now has to work without it.

What the Credit Actually Covered

Section 30C of the Internal Revenue Code provided a federal tax credit against a percentage of the cost of purchasing and installing EV charging equipment. Eligible costs included hardware, installation labor, wiring, wall mounts, and the electrical panel upgrades required to power the charger.

For commercial and business-use property the structure had two tiers, and the difference between them was the detail most often left out:

  • Base credit, 6% of eligible project costs, capped at $100,000 per item of charging property.
  • Enhanced credit, 30% of eligible project costs, under the same $100,000 cap, available only where the project met both prevailing wage requirements for installation labor and registered apprenticeship requirements for a specified portion of the work.

Six percent was the default. Thirty percent was conditional, and the conditions were labor conditions that a small installation often could not practically meet. Any copy that quoted a flat 30% for commercial property was inaccurate at the time it was written, not only after the expiry.

Eligibility also depended on location. The installation had to sit in a census tract the IRS treated as eligible, meaning either a low-income community, defined by a poverty rate of at least 20%, or a non-urban tract, defined by at least 10% of census blocks falling outside an urban area. A property outside those tracts received nothing at either rate.

The credit was claimed on IRS Form 8911 with the return for the year the equipment was placed in service.

The Placed-in-Service Rule Caught People Out

June 30, 2026 was not a purchase deadline or a contract deadline. The equipment had to be placed in service, meaning fully installed and operational, on or before that date. Ordering hardware, signing a vendor agreement, or breaking ground did not qualify.

Projects needing an electrical service upgrade, permitting, or utility coordination required months of lead time to clear that bar. Owners who began planning after the acceleration was announced often could not finish in time. That is worth remembering the next time a federal program carries a placed-in-service test rather than a contract test.

What Changes for a Property Owner Evaluating Charging Now

The credit was never the reason to install chargers. It reduced the cost of entry to a case that had to stand on its own, and after June 30, 2026 that case has to stand on its own in full.

Three things carry more weight now than they did while the credit was available.

The capital structure of the deal. If the property funds the hardware, that cost is now unsubsidized and the payback period lengthens accordingly. A revenue share or host arrangement, where a charging partner funds and owns the equipment, moves the question from payback to what share of session revenue the property keeps. The tradeoff is set out in the comparison of revenue share against ownership.

The true installed cost. Vendor quotes frequently exclude trenching, panel capacity, network fees, and payment processing. Those line items were easier to absorb against a credit. The breakdown of hidden costs in EV charging installation covers what a quote tends to leave out.

Utilization. A charger that sits idle earns nothing regardless of what it cost to install. Siting, pricing, and session policy now carry the whole return. Idle fees and session limits are the levers that keep a bay turning over.

State and utility programs operate independently of the federal credit, and they vary by jurisdiction and by year. Any specific program should be confirmed directly with the utility or the state agency before it is counted in a project budget. Nothing here should be read as a statement that a replacement incentive exists.

The Bottom Line

Section 30C is closed. An EV charging project evaluated today stands or falls on session revenue, tenant draw, and the terms of the agreement with whoever owns the hardware. That was always the durable part of the case. EV charging as a parking revenue stream sets out how it fits alongside paid parking on the same asset.

This page is for informational purposes only and does not constitute tax advice. Consult a qualified tax professional about your situation.