Higher gas prices have made electric vehicles more attractive, and convenience stores are investing in more charging stations, writes Dana Hull for bloomberg.com.

Wawa and its competitor Sheetz have both added electric charging stations to their services.

As of April 2022 Wawa was reporting 87 EV charging locations and 2 million charging sessions.

At Sheetz’ 645 stations in Maryland, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia and West Virginia, 14% had electric vehicle charging stations, with 70% of those being Tesla-branded fast chargers.

Hull found that out on a recent summer drive with her teenage son from Washington, D.C. through Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and West Virginia, a thousand mile journey in a rented Tesla.

She relied on Sheetz mostly to charge her rented Tesla, particularly in rural areas.

Charging her 23% battery to 97% took about a half hour and cost $18.81.

“Convenience stores see EV charging as an opportunity,” says John Gartner, a senior director at the Center for Sustainable Energy in Colorado. “With EV charging, there’s longer ‘dwell times’ where people are spending more time in the store, and their chance to make money on things like food and drinks that have very high margins is greatly increased.”

Read more at Bloomberg about convenience store charging stations.

It’s the craziest electric vehicle charging station in the world.