I’d like to think that I’m a relatively environmentally conscious person. I live a beef-free, kid-free, reasonably car-free life. I don’t invest in fossil fuels. I’m a minimalist. But – and this is a huge but – I like to travel. I took eight one-way flights last year. So, it’s complicated.. So, when my partner and I planned a road trip from British Columbia to Alberta earlier this year, I wanted to make it as planet-friendly as possible.
I had some charger anxiety – would we end up stranded somewhere? But taking a long-distance road trip in an electric vehicle in Canada is now easier than ever before. There are across the country – a 30 per cent increase since the beginning of 2022. And the chargers are not only to be found in big cities either. Parks Canada, for example, has over 400 EV charging stations installed from coast to coast, with another 50 planned by the end of 2024.
With our Vancouver visit winding down, it was time to find an electric car. There are so many places to rent EVs these days. Hertz, Enterprise, Budget and Avis all have EVs in their fleets. Turo, the Airbnb of cars, also offers them. Ultimately, we went with, a B.C.-based EV rental and car-sharing company that offers one-way rentals. Zerocar has 50 Teslas in its fleet with plans for more and additional vehicle pick-up locations in Toronto by 2024.