Ford CEO hit with 'reality check' when trying to charge EV truck on US road trip

Ford CEO Jim Farley said he got a "reality check" when he tried to charge his electric car during a road trip across the American West. The incident comes as the Biden administration has spent billions of taxpayer funds to boost electric transportation.   

With windmills in the background, Farley posted a video to X while he was on a trip across the Western United States in which he made the admission that his experience trying to recharge his car was a "really good reality check" to see the challenges his customers are facing on a regular basis.   

Farley said that it took his car 40 minutes to get up to only a 40 percent charge on his car. If he were to be using a gas-powered vehicle, the process of refueling would take a mere fraction of that time in comparison.   

He openly admitted he would need to investigate the "importance of fast charging" for his customers more. Farley said he had stopped at "one of the most popular charging sites in the country on the I-5" in Coalinga, California and still had trouble getting a decent charge.   

One man with an EV Hummer in January had a similar but more extreme experience of a slow charger taking an estimated five days to completely charge his vehicle.  



This is not the only issue that has come about because of EV charging stations. Last year, a study in the San Francisco Bay area found that of all the public chargers in the region, nearly 23 percent were classified as "non-functioning" with broken screens, payment failure and broken chargers among some of the most common issues.   

On June 27, 2023, President Joe Biden and his administration released a fact sheet covering wide investments into EV charging stations up to $55 billion dollars. The infrastructure plan is designed to provide 1.2 million public access charging stations.   

The fact sheet touted the accomplishment, saying, "This shows how effectively the Biden-Harris Administration has catalyzed private investment in a race to line our highways and roads with public chargers."  

Of the chargers to be installed, the Biden administration announced one million will be "Level 2 charging" stations. A level two charger, according to EVconnect.com, enables a vehicle to drive between 12-80 miles on an hour-long charge.  

Depending on the make and model of the car Farley was driving, this charging time could be even slower than the one he talked about in the video.