The investments support projects with a focus on education and raising awareness about electric vehicles and public charging

Thirty-five projects across Canada are receiving $7.5 million in federal government zero-emission vehicle awareness initiative (ZEVAI) funding.

The focus of this latest round of funding supports organizations dedicated to raising awareness and education about electric vehicles, public charging, refuelling infrastructure and clean fuels.

The $7.5 million was allocated to three streams:

• $4,236,774 for medium- and heavy-duty vehicles;
• $1,947,928 light-duty vehicles; and
• $1,321,750 clean fuels.

In addition, the government launched a new webpage to help organizations identify which ongoing federal zero-emission vehicle infrastructure funding opportunities they are eligible for.

Successful ZEVAI funding recipients

The recipients of this round of ZEVAI funding are spread across nine provinces.

They include Dalhousie University, the University of Manitoba, the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, the City of Saskatoon, the Coopérative de Solidarité Carbone-Coop Carbone and NEI Association Inc.

Projects range from educational programming about zero-emission vehicles to establishing science, technology engineering and math (STEM) programming for elementary-aged children and raising awareness about micro-mobility.

For this round of funding, the maximum amount given to projects is $300,000. The minimum is just over $46,000.

The full list of successfully funded programs is available here.

Additional funding opportunities

According to the government website, there are currently three different ZEV infrastructure funding rounds open for applications. There is also one under the ZEVAI program.

The Zero-Emission Vehicle Infrastructure Program (ZEVIP) is open for proposals for EV charger deployment.

Canada Infrastructure Bank is funding projects focused on large-scale electric vehicle charging and hydrogen fuel stations.

And the Zero-Emission Transit fund is open to applications from public transit and school bus fleet operators looking to transition to zero-emission buses.

The current ZEVAI opening is a request for proposals for Indigenous-led projects that address knowledge gaps around ZEVs and low-carbon vehicles.