“Cut project cost up to five times through tax credits.”

This bold claim appears on the website for Miller Electric Co.’s Miller EV Solutions in Jacksonville, Fla. The company urges prospective electric vehicle customers to check out incentives offered through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which has allocated $7.5 billion toward EV charging and the construction of a national network of 500,000 EV charging stations.

Tax credits and deductions

For EV charging construction projects, the federal government is offering a plethora of enhanced tax credits and deductions for charge point operators (CPO) wanting to expand charging networks as well as for businesses and local government agencies wanting to switch to EV fleets.

The tax incentives are listed on Miller’s EV Solutions website and the IRS website. They include:

• Alternative fuel refueling property credit
• Production tax credit
• Carbon oxide (CO_x, i.e., carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide) sequestration credit
• Clean hydrogen production credit
• Clean fuel production credit
• Investment tax credit
• Advanced energy project credit
• Energy-efficient commercial buildings deduction
• Additional provisions for new energy-efficient homes and zero-emission nuclear power production.

But why should an electrical contractor bother to make prospective customers aware of these goodies? That seems like the job of an accountant.

There are many reasons, according to Kerri Stewart, chief strategy officer for Miller Electric. It helps customers save money while reducing carbon emissions. It builds customer relationships. And it’s something electrical contractors are suited for.

“The incentive for us providing this information is to be a valued partner with our customers, and to provide added value,” Stewart said. “For customers, it’s almost like having access to direct cash.”

Prevailing wage

Cashing in on IRA-related tax credits and deductions requires proving compliance with the Davis-Bacon Act of 1931, which deals with prevailing wage. The act requires payment of wages considered fair and reasonable for the location in which labor is performed for participation in federally funded or incentivized projects.

According to the IRS, “by meeting prevailing wage and apprenticeship requirements under the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, taxpayers can increase the base amounts of these incentives by five times.”

Having proof of paying prevailing wage is essential for financing clean energy and other infrastructure projects through the IRA.

“If companies are going to go after federal funding and tax incentives, their paperwork must show who earned the prevailing wage,” Stewart said. “We help them get their funding on the front end and make sure there’s compliance on the back end as far as tax rebates.”

To achieve these impressive savings from the beginning to the end of projects, taxpayers must also include prevailing wage information for each position and bid location in estimates.

NECA chapters, IBEWs and JATCs all maintain prevailing wage information for members, and the Department of Labor also provides a link for researching wage info at www.SAM.gov.

Workforce benefits

A major strength of the IRA for the electrical industry is that it connects climate goals and carbon curbing investments with job creation efforts.

To tap the national EV infrastructure fund, work must be done by those trained through the Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Training Program, which enrolls certified journeymen in their fourth or fifth year of apprentice training.

EV technicians also may be employed. “They don’t have to be four or five years along like an apprentice electrician,” Stewart said.

Training varies per technician program and can take place at an authorized private technical school or community college. The ratio of tech to journeyman varies with jurisdiction.

“They do not do the wiring, they do diagnostics and resetting the network,” Stewart said. “No hardwiring.”

Miller Electric constantly recruits for EV techs and apprentices at community colleges, high schools and job fairs, Stewart said. “Instead of seeing EV techs as competition, we see them as future apprentices.”

This [EV infrastructure] effort has been dramatically expanded through the Inflation Reduction Act, which devotes funds to roads, bridges, broadband, electrical infrastructure and other infrastructure. The EV portion pertains to everything from fleets consisting of passenger cars to tractor-trailer rigs.”

—Kerri Stewart

Grants

For several years, electric utilities have incentivized customers to transition to EVs and EV charging, Stewart said. Their goal has been to reduce carbon emissions and help customers curb energy costs.

 “It’s not unlike what we saw with the advent of solar and LED, and lighting controls—all programs administered via the utilities,” Stewart said.

States established energy-efficiency programs and regulated utilities to create funding pots based on percentage fees paid by customers on their monthly bills.

Since before the Biden administration, the EPA and other federal agencies have provided tax credits to companies and individuals for investments in EV infrastructure.

“This effort has been dramatically expanded through the Inflation Reduction Act, which devotes funds to roads, bridges, broadband, electrical infrastructure and other infrastructure,” Stewart said. “The EV portion pertains to everything from fleets consisting of passenger cars to tractor-trailer rigs.”

Beyond IRA funds, Miller Electric helps customers scout other EV funding opportunities.

“We do help the vehicle manager and the charge point operator look for grant funding and tax incentives,” Stewart said. “There can be multiple layers.”

“Utility programs have shifted from direct rebates for installing EV chargers and purchasing fleets more to supporting make-ready efforts, which cost a lot more than most people realize,” she said.

This is due in part to utilities and federal and local governments wanting to get clean energy projects up and running fast, but it’s also due to their recognition of the significant hurdles to readiness.

“A lot of our customers are already aware of the credits, but some traffic managers purchase new EV fleets, not realizing the cost of bringing in the necessary additional power to their locations,” Stewart said. “They may decide, ‘yes,’ they’re ready for a charging station, but a lot goes to getting sites ready to power DC for fast charging and AC for slower charging.”

A company fleet manager may have rarely ever spoken with the property manager. The focus has always been dispatch, purchasing fuel and maintaining vehicles. 

“Now the two managers are inextricably linked,” Stewart said.

Utilities may upgrade their infrastructure to support bigger loads. A large site may require a new transformer, switchgear or additional high-voltage connections.

“Utilities typically have their own line contractors for this work,” Stewart said.

At the end of the day, it’s a grant competition. And whoever is issuing the funding wants to ensure the applicant is both satisfying a grant’s specific requirements and providing maximum benefit aligned with the grant objective.”

—Zach Magid

Miller Electric has cultivated relationships with utility companies throughout the country and is helping CPOs install public fast-charging stations. It also installs plenty of EV chargers for businesses and multiresidential campuses.

Ensuring funding

Similarly, Millennium Communications Group Inc., East Hanover, N.J., helps customers obtain grants and tax incentives for infrastructure and community projects. The idea is to build customer relationships, gain more business and make the world a better place through strengthening communities.

“We see it as an obligation to help our clients obtain grant funding for infrastructure projects,” said Zach Magid, chief operating officer for Millennium Communications Group.

“We often work with grant writers who are engaged with our customers, and we provide the added expertise of estimating the cost for a system, whether it be cost for miles of fiber for internet service or security systems, cameras or labor for installation.”

Millennium Communications Group has helped local communities, library districts, schools and a local zoo improve their services and security measures by fortifying grant writers with cost information.

In doing this, they’re often selected to perform related work.

Grant writers, as Magid explained, provide specific data related to community challenges and needs, as well as efficacy analyses for proposed solutions. They may, for example, research crime incidents and apprehension of suspects related to a local area, while also analyzing track records for new crime-fighting technologies such as automated license plate readers.

A grant writer might also help define a need for security cameras or internet connections related to a patron experience analysis.

“At the end of the day, it’s a grant competition,” Magid said. “And whoever is issuing the funding wants to ensure the applicant is both satisfying a grant’s specific requirements and providing maximum benefit aligned with the grant objective.”

Most of the major grants and projects Millennium Communication Group gets involved in are federal, but they also work on many state, local and municipal grants. 

“For just about all, it helps to have affiliation with a JATC program to guarantee we have qualified staff,” Magid said.

Magid described the process of fostering connections with government entities and related customers as a random process that requires maintaining a presence within local communities and building relationships with local organizations.

 “You don’t receive these opportunities to serve clients unless you’re in the right place at the right time,” he said.

stock.adobe.com / Jon Buckley / Mykola