EVs Have Arrived. Now Australia Needs the System to Match

Originally published on EV Infrastructure Summit June 2nd 2026.

Convincing people to buy electric vehicles was yesterday’s mission. Today, the task is building a scalable system that can support mass EV adoption and prepare Australia for the next transport shift: autonomous mobility. 

As Australia’s EV market moves from early adoption to scale, Bjorn Siem, Senior Policy Manager at the Electric Vehicle Council, says the challenge is no longer proving electric vehicles work, but building resilient charging, policy, property and grid systems that make electric transport easier, cheaper and more reliable for everyone.

Lessons from Norway

Raised on Norway’s west coast, Siem has watched the world’s leading EV market evolve from early policy experiment to mainstream transport reality.

Norway’s success is often reduced to subsidies, but Siem argues consistency matters more. Stable policy settings gave consumers, carmakers, charging providers and investors confidence that the transition was real. Once vehicles were on the road in significant numbers, the private sector had clear motivation to build charging infrastructure around them.

Australia can learn from Norway, but it cannot emulate it directly. Its geography, housing stock, electricity system, vehicle mix and freight task are all different. That makes Australia’s transition less about copying one policy model and more about designing a system that fits local conditions.

The opportunity is to build a model that reflects Australia’s strengths: high levels of home solar, widespread detached housing, growing fleet demand and a transport network that can be designed around where vehicles already park.

The ultimate adoption lever

We are now entering the next phase of EVs adoption and if Australia wants to accelerate the transition at scale, “fleets are the biggest lever to make the transition happen,” explains Siem. 

Sitting at the intersection of vehicle supply and operational use, fleets shape the new vehicle market. They buy in volume, have faster vehicle turnover than private owners and help create second-hand supply as every fleet vehicle purchased today has the potential to become a more affordable second-hand EV in a few years’ time. 

 

This helps move EVs from early-adopter products into mainstream transport, but there are constraints: EVs tend to carry higher upfront costs and uncertain residual values. Commercial options have previously been limited in categories that matter to Australian businesses, such as utes, vans and heavy work vehicles, but as more models enter the market and total cost of ownership improves, the fleet case is becoming harder to ignore.

Testing the system

Not just a parking lot, fleet depots are an electrified transport system that integrates into the energy network. More complex than simply a single plug on a wall; fleet operations need scheduling, energy, infrastructure and operational change.

Operators need to understand when vehicles return, how long they dwell, how much charge they need, what routes they serve and what power the site can support. Poorly managed charging can drive up peak demand, overload site capacity or require expensive grid upgrades. Managed charging, however, can shift demand, use cheaper off-peak electricity, align with solar generation and ensure vehicles are ready when needed.

This changes the role of the fleet manager; they are no longer simply buying vehicles and managing fuel use. They are making decisions about electricity infrastructure, energy contracts, software, charging behaviour and future depot design.

For heavy fleets, the challenge amplifies. Waste vehicles, buses, prime movers, tankers and off-road equipment bring additional questions around route suitability, payload, depot power, charging speed, road access and vehicle availability. It is not enough for the vehicle to exist; operators need to know it can perform the route, carry the required load and access the roads and charging infrastructure needed to run reliably.

“If you can’t operate your electric truck on the routes that you need, then obviously you’re not going to get one regardless of how cheap they are,” says Siem.

That is why heavy vehicle electrification cannot be treated as a simple vehicle swap. It requires planning across transport routes, infrastructure, energy networks and government jurisdictions. Long-haul charging corridors need coordination between states. Depot upgrades need planning with distribution networks. Operators need confidence that charging infrastructure will arrive in the right places, at the right scale and at the right time.

But the same principle applies beyond fleet depots: EV adoption only scales when charging is built around how people and vehicles actually move.

Charging must feel normal

For households with a driveway or garage, however, EV ownership can be straightforward: plug in at home and use public charging for longer trips. This gives Australia an advantage over denser markets where drivers predominantly rely on kerbside or public charging.

For mass adoption, convenience takes precedence. Apartment residents, renters and people without dedicated parking chargers need public charges in communal areas and at the workplace. “In the future, you won’t go somewhere to charge,” says Siem. “You’ll charge where you go.” 

That means supermarkets, gyms, cafes, workplaces, car parks, retail precincts, public hubs and highway sites all become part of the charging ecosystem. But this requires more than hardware – it needs reliable access, simple payment, accurate availability data, roaming between networks and a seamless user experience.

Currently, public charging feels fragmented. Drivers often need different apps for different networks, availability data can be unreliable, payment systems vary, and some chargers are slow, occupied, offline or inconveniently located. For early adopters, these frustrations may be manageable. For the mass market, they become barriers to uptake.

Siem points to roaming and plug-and-charge as part of the solution. In a mature system, drivers should not need different accounts for every network. They should plug in, have the vehicle recognised and be billed automatically. Suggesting larger, more reliable charging sites, Siem notes that in Norway, the difference is not the number of charging locations, but the number of chargers at each site. A driver is far more confident stopping at a charge location with 20 chargers than somewhere with only two.

Why coordination matters now

The faster EV adoption grows, the more important coordination becomes. Fleets, charging, property and grid capacity now need to mature together so the experience keeps improving as adoption grows.

Siem points to busy travel periods where regional charging queues have already emerged, with multiple vehicles caught waiting for one or two chargers. For a confident EV owner who charges at home most of the year, this is an occasional inconvenience. For a new EV buyer, or someone relying on public charging, this shapes their entire perception of the technology.

Good experiences build confidence; easy charging, trusted availability information, simple payment systems and accessible charging where they live normalises EVs quickly. But bad experiences travel quicker. Poor early experiences can slow confidence, discourage new buyers and make the transition feel harder than it needs to be.

There’s grid risk, too. When managed intelligently, EVs can support the electricity system. Left unmanaged, charging can create local pressure. If households on one street charge at the same time, or depots electrify without planning, local infrastructure will need upgrades faster than anticipated. 

Australia needs a coordinated national approach to charging – not just individual projects. Planning needs to include home, public, and depot charging, heavy vehicles, buses, and freight corridors, apartment buildings and the electricity supply chain that supports them.

If Australia can coordinate the systems around EVs now, it will build the capability needed for the next phase of transport, including autonomous vehicles. The EV transition is not a detour from the future of mobility – it is the foundation for it.

More than cleaner cars

Not just a “greener way to travel,” EVs can become energy assets in the right system. Siem experienced this during a cyclone in Brisbane, when his household lost power. He ran essential appliances from an EV using vehicle-to-load (V2L) technology. The car powered the fridge, coffee machine, television and router. At that moment, the EV was no longer just a transport asset – it was backup infrastructure.

That capability will become more important as vehicle-to-home and vehicle-to-grid technologies mature. EV batteries are much larger than most home batteries, and if integrated with solar, household energy systems and the grid, they could help households lower bills, improve resilience and support the electricity system during periods of stress.

For businesses, the argument is increasingly commercial as well as environmental. Fleets dependent on diesel are exposed to fuel price shocks and supply disruption. “Transitioning away from fossil fuels is actually a risk mitigation strategy now,” says Siem.

Fleet electrification is not simply about swapping one vehicle type for another. It is about building a transport system that is cheaper to run, less exposed to imported fuel, better integrated with domestic energy and more resilient when disruption hits.

The vehicles have already arrived. The opportunity now is to build the system to match — one that turns EVs from cleaner cars into cheaper transport, flexible energy assets and a foundation for the next phase of mobility.

Bjorn Siem will chair Day Two of EVI26, focused on EV Fleet Transitions, at Doltone House Darling Island, Sydney. The programme will explore depot charging, fleet decarbonisation, heavy vehicle electrification, grid integration and the operating models needed to scale EV infrastructure across Australia and New Zealand. View the brochure for details on his session and the full two-day agenda.