After a modest start, Long Beach-based WattEV Holdings Inc. is now rapidly moving to build out its electric heavy-duty truck charging network in California.

Last month, WattEV announced the expansion of its existing charging depot at the Port of Long Beach, adding 12 charging units to the 16 already there. Each unit can charge two trucks simultaneously. WattEV also announced two new depot locations along routes with heavy truck traffic: one in Baker on Interstate 15 in the Mojave Desert (on the way to Las Vegas) and the other in Otay Mesa, near the port of entry from Mexico into the United States. The Baker depot is slated for 10 charging units and the Otay Mesa depot for seven units.

This package of announcements follows the groundbreaking in June for a heavy-duty truck charging depot with roughly a dozen charging units at the Port of Oakland, the largest port in Northern California.

Change in EV truck technology

Salim Youssefzadeh, WattEV’s chief executive, said this burst of new and expanded depots is in preparation for an expected major development next year related to the charging for heavy-duty electric trucks.

“The inflection point in freight electrification is arriving with the introduction of trucks capable of megawatt charging at scale,” Youssefzadeh said. “We see 2026 as the turning point, and we are building ahead of demand to ensure that all major freight corridors in California are ready.”

WattEV was founded just five years ago and opened its first charging depot for heavy-duty electric trucks only two summers ago at the Port of Long Beach. After that, the company opened four more charging depots: two more in Los Angeles County – one in Gardena and the other in Vernon – along with a charging depot near San Bernardino, one and the third just north of Bakersfield.

Assuming all of the recently announced depots come online by next year, that will bring the total number of depots to eight – all built within a three-year span.

WattEV until recently has drawn on a mixture of state and federal funding for these depots, especially from the federal infrastructure funding package enacted during former President Joe Biden’s administration in 2021. But with increased uncertainty on the federal front during under current President Donald Trump administration, WattEV has turned to state resources. Much of the funding for its latest crop of charging depots is coming from a $24 million grant from the California Transportation Commission.