Technology Breakthrough Offers Airports a New Path to EV Charging Without New Electrical Infrastructure

At airports across the United States, demand for electric vehicle charging is growing faster than the infrastructure needed to support it. Passengers increasingly expect EV charging as part of the parking experience. But for airport operators, expanding charging capacity has proven expensive, disruptive, and slow—often requiring new electrical service, utility coordination, and major construction in active parking facilities.

One EV charging company believes it has found a way to change that equation.

In December, Carlsbad, California–based Zevtron introduced a new charging system designed to operate on existing parking facility lighting circuits. By using electrical capacity freed up by LED lighting retrofits—upgrades that nearly every airport has already completed—the new technology allows EV chargers to be deployed without installing new panels, feeders, or dedicated breakers.

Zevtron’s airport EV charging approach combines the use of existing lighting circuits, its patented smart pedestal, advanced load balancing, and traveler return-time awareness to reshape how charging is deployed at airports. The smart pedestal is central to this model for two reasons: when powered from lighting circuits, each charger includes its own integrated breaker within the pedestal, allowing chargers to be installed without the need to add costly wiring and conduits, and serviced or replaced without shutting down garage or lot lighting. When fed from a dedicated electrical source, the pedestal enables a single 200-amp, three-phase feeder to support multiple chargers, eliminating the need for individual home-run circuits to each charging port.

Zevtron’s software dynamically balances available power across all connected chargers and further enhances efficiency by asking drivers when they expect to return, allowing charging to be scheduled and prioritized so vehicles are ready when the traveler returns, rather than being charged as quickly as possible. The result is a scalable, lower-cost EV charging approach that lets airports add more chargers, faster, and with far less electrical and operational disruption.

“This is a very exciting technology that could be a real difference maker for US airports,” said John Groden, CPP, Vice President of Airports for the parking operator Parking Concepts Inc. and President of the Board of the Airport Ground Transportation Association. “For airports struggling to scale charging across large garages and surface lots, this approach could significantly reduce costs and deployment timelines and avoid the operational disruption that has slowed many airport EV projects.”

“Airports are sitting on a massive amount of unused electrical capacity,” said Bob Andrews, CEO of Zevtron. “Once facilities converted to LED lighting, the demand on those circuits dropped dramatically. The pedestal allows airports to safely use that available power to support EV charging where drivers actually park.”

A Persistent Challenge for Airport Parking

Airport parking presents a unique EV challenge. Facilities are expansive, often spread across multiple garages and remote lots, and electrical rooms are frequently operating near capacity. Adding new EV chargers has typically meant trenching through active parking areas, upgrading panels, or even increasing utility service. These projects are expensive, time-consuming, and difficult to phase without disrupting traffic and revenue.

As a result, many airports have installed only a limited number of chargers, often clustered near terminals rather than distributed throughout parking facilities. That leaves many customers underserved and creates bottlenecks at the few chargers that do exist.

“This technology takes a different approach by relying on existing lighting infrastructure to power EV deployment,” said Andrews. “Parking garages already have lighting circuits running to nearly every row of stalls, often terminating near light poles or fixtures that are ideally located for vehicle charging. Airports can now tap into those circuits to cost-effectively provide charging capacity.”

Installation of the technology requires a full energy analysis of each circuit to determine compatibility, available load, and the number and size of chargers that can be deployed. Once approved, the pedestal functions as a self-contained protective device, isolating each charger while ensuring that the overall circuit remains within code limits.

“Nothing else in the market works this way,” said Chris McKenty, Zevtron’s senior vice president of sales and marketing. “The built-in breaker allows chargers to be installed almost anywhere lighting exists, without compromising safety or requiring electrical room upgrades.”

According to Zevtron, the result is typically a 40 to 60 percent reduction in installation costs compared to traditional EV charging projects, along with dramatically faster deployment timelines.

Why Airports Are an Ideal Fit

Airport parking environments align closely with the strengths of lighting-fed charging. Vehicles are parked for extended periods—often multiple days—making them well-suited for steady, lower-power charging rather than high-speed DC fast charging. That charging profile fits naturally with the available capacity on lighting circuits. Instead of overbuilding electrical infrastructure to support short bursts of high power, airports can deploy more chargers across a wider footprint, serving more vehicles over longer dwell times.

Remote and economy lots, which have historically been excluded from EV charging due to infrastructure costs, become viable candidates under this model, as well. These lots often have extensive lighting coverage, but limited access to electrical rooms makes traditional installations especially challenging.

“Long-stay airport parking is exactly the use case this was designed for,” Andrews said. “If a traveler is parked for three, four, or five days, they don’t need fast charging. They need confidence that their car will be charged when they return. And they need it at a reasonable cost.”

Beyond installation savings, the technology is designed with airport operations in mind. Each Smart Pedestal allows individual chargers to be isolated, serviced, or replaced without taking other chargers on the circuit offline. That capability reduces downtime and simplifies maintenance in facilities where hundreds of chargers may eventually be deployed. It also allows airports to scale charging incrementally, adding units as demand grows without reengineering the entire system. The system integrates fully with OCPP- and OCPI-compliant software platforms, enabling features that are increasingly important to airport parking operators, including dynamic pricing, driver authentication, load balancing, and PCI-compliant payment processing.

Importantly for airports, the platform also integrates with parking access and revenue control systems and license plate recognition technology, allowing EV charging to function as part of a unified parking operation rather than a standalone service. 

“This will be one of the most attractive benefits of the technology,” said Groden. “Having the ability to manage parking and EV charging together and charge for both through a single transaction will allow airports to offer a much more convenient travel experience. It will also dramatically simplify parking and EV charging management.”

“For many airports, that integration is essential,” said Mckenty. “EV charging must align with existing parking rates, reservation systems, loyalty programs, and enforcement rules. Fragmented systems can create customer confusion and administrative complexity.

The platform is designed to communicate with all elements of the travel experience,” continued Mckenty. “For instance, the traveler’s flight information can be synced with the charging network. As a result, the charging session can be managed to the second, assuring that it is completed by the time the traveler returns.”

Rethinking EV Infrastructure in Aviation

The broader implication is a shift in how airports think about EV infrastructure. Instead of treating charging as a specialized electrical project, it reframes it as an extension of systems that are already in place. 

Nearly every airport has invested heavily in LED lighting over the past decade, driven by energy efficiency mandates and sustainability goals. Those projects reduced energy consumption and maintenance costs, but they also created excess capacity that, until now, had little practical use. By repurposing that capacity, airports can accelerate EV charging deployment without waiting for major capital cycles or utility upgrades.

“Our focus is on removing barriers,” said Andrews. “Airports shouldn’t have to choose between meeting customer expectations and managing capital responsibly. By using lighting circuits that already exist, EV charging becomes faster, simpler, and more affordable to deploy.”