Sustainability Street: How One Property Manager Solved the EV Charging Puzzle

The electric vehicle transition is largely a building-level challenge. Find out how FirstService Residential's George Barriere rose to it.

George Barriere

EV charging has become a must-have amenity for apartment dwellers as well as commercial tenants. But the planning and placing of EV chargers is no small task for property managers.

Welcome back to Sustainability Street, our podcast on the intersection of commercial real estate and the world we live in. My guest for this episode is FirstService Residential’s George Barriere, general manager of the Marina Palms Yacht Club & Residences, a 470-unit condominium complex in North Miami Beach, Fla.

When EV usage began increasing at the luxury property, Barriere installed the ADS-TEC Energy ChargeBox, which consists of a battery-booster box and two fast-charging dispensers. Tune into hear how and why he chose this system to meet his residents’ current and future charging needs. As Barriere puts it, if residents have the charging capability they require at their buildings, they will buy more EVs. If they buy more EVs, buildings will need more chargers.

Here a sample of the topics we discussed:

Rising demand for charging (3:13)

Multifamily pain points (4:59)

A “million” different business models (6:53)

A solution for the future (8:42)

The value proposition (15:48)

Who bears the cost? (20:23)

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