CALeVIP Fast Charging Grants: Window 2 Opens October 7, 2026, and What to Have Ready

Window 2 of the Fast Charge California Project opens for applications at 9:00 a.m. Pacific on Wednesday, October 7, 2026. The project is a DC fast charging arm of the California Energy Commission's California Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Project (CALeVIP), has at least $27.6 million to reserve, and it reserves that money in the order complete applications arrive. A valid application needs an issued permit and a final utility service design at submission. A site without both cannot enter the queue on opening day.

This page covers both of the windows the CEC scheduled in May 2026, what the program requires, and the specific documents to have in hand before you apply.

⚠️ Timing note: Both of these CALeVIP windows open after June 30, 2026, the date the federal Section 30C Alternative Fuel Vehicle Refueling Property Credit ended under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (Public Law 119-21). A project applying in either window will be placed in service well after that date, so it cannot claim the federal 30C credit. Build the funding math around the California incentive, not the federal credit.

The two windows at a glance

On May 28, 2026 the CEC announced $55.2 million for public DC fast charging across two application windows. CALeVIP labels them Window 2 and Window 3, following the first Fast Charge California window that closed in January 2026. Charged EVs' June 1, 2026 coverage of the announcement presents the $55 million alongside the October window's terms without splitting it between the windows. The Window 2 Implementation Manual commits "at least $27.6 million" to Window 2, roughly half the announced total, so budget your odds against that figure.

Window 2: 9:00 a.m. PT October 7, 2026 to 5:00 p.m. PT January 14, 2027. Covers up to 100% of eligible installation costs for DC fast chargers, capped per charging port by guaranteed output: $55,000 per port from 150 kW to 274.99 kW, and $100,000 per port at 275 kW and above (Implementation Manual, Table 5). A site is paid on a minimum of 4 and a maximum of 20 ports; you may build more, but the incentive stops at 20.

The $100,000 figure is the one the CEC leads with, and it only applies to ports guaranteed at 275 kW or more. Assuming it for a 150 kW or 200 kW port overstates the incentive by $45,000 per port, which on an eight-port site is a $360,000 hole in a project budget. The manual's own worked example is eight 175 kW ports in Los Angeles County: eight $55,000 caps, $440,000 at most.

Window 3: February 24, 2027 to May 27, 2027. Covers up to 100% of eligible installation costs, up to $55,000 per port, for any qualifying charger with a minimum output of 150 kW. CALeVIP's Window 3 page still says the full program page will be released later, and no Window 3 implementation manual is published as of September 30, 2026, so its port minimums, maximums, and site output rules are not final. Treat every Window 3 figure as announced rather than settled.

Window 3 is lower at the top because it removes the separate tier for 275 kW and above: all eligible equipment defaults to the same $55,000 per port. If your project leans on very high-power hardware, Window 2 is where the larger per-port number lives.

Guaranteed output, not nameplate, decides which Window 2 tier you land in. The program requires each port to deliver its guaranteed output simultaneously, with every port on the site in use. A 350 kW charger sharing a constrained service with three others may only guarantee 200 kW per port, which places it in the $55,000 tier despite its nameplate.

How the Window 2 queue works

Window 2 is not a scored competition. Funding is reserved on a rolling, first-come, first-served basis in order of submission, with one exception, and it runs until the money is reserved or the window closes, whichever comes first.

Only "Tier 1: Ready to Build" applications enter the queue. Tier 1 means you submitted both an issued permit for the installation and a final utility service design (or an official utility letter stating no new or upgraded service is needed). An application missing either is cancelled, not waitlisted. You can resubmit once you have both, but you go to the back of the queue. CALeVIP says it will tell you within 15 calendar days of submission whether you made Tier 1.

The priority rule is narrower than "priority for underserved areas" suggests. An application gets priority only when 100% of the DC fast chargers in it are in a disadvantaged community, a low-income community, or on tribal land. The first two are census tracts as mapped on the California Climate Investments Priority Populations map; tribal land is land owned by tribes or held in trust for them. A qualifying application is processed ahead of every non-priority application received on or after its own received date. It does not leapfrog applications that were already waiting when it arrived, and a project with even one charger outside those areas gets no priority at all. Check your census tract before you assume you qualify.

Nothing is set aside by region, and siting in a priority area is not required. The whole pool is statewide, and a project anywhere in California can apply.

One entity cannot take the pool. No single legal entity, or group of affiliated companies considered together, may receive more than 35% of total FCCP-2 funding, and none may have more than 50 active applications or projects open across CALeVIP 2.0 and Communities in Charge. The cap also applies to contractors listed on applications.

Timelines after a reservation are tight. From the date funds are reserved you have 90 days to submit the official equipment and switchgear order, placed directly with the vendor in your own legal name, or the application is cancelled. You have 450 days to have the chargers energized, fully operational, and documented. If a queue remains at the end of the window, CALeVIP says it will notify successful applicants by March 1, 2027 and unsuccessful applicants by March 3, 2027. Payment comes after completion, typically within about two weeks of final approval.

What to have ready before October 7

Everything below comes from the Window 2 Implementation Manual, dated September 18, 2026. CALeVIP treats what you submit during the window as final and may not accept corrections, so assemble the package before the portal opens.

1. An issued permit. A copy of the issued permit for the installation, or a letter on the authority having jurisdiction's letterhead stating it is a self-permitting agency. An application in process at the permit counter is not enough.
2. A final utility service design. Or an official letter from your utility stating no new or upgraded service is needed. A utility redesign after funds are reserved cancels the application, and redesigns do not qualify for an extension, so the design you submit has to be the one you build. If your site will draw more than 2 MW, ask your utility now whether a large load study applies; the manual warns that one can push a project past its deadlines.
3. The same legal name and tax ID everywhere. The applicant, the charger owner, and the incentive recipient must be the same legal entity, with an identical legal name and federal tax ID on the application, the permit, the utility documents, invoices, and network agreements. If the permit or utility account is in your contractor's name, you need supporting paperwork, such as the contract or utility work order, tying it to you.
4. A signed Site Verification Form. Every application needs one, whether or not you own the property. The applicant, the property owner, and the site owner each sign it, and it must carry your exact legal name and tax ID. The form is in CALeVIP's document library.
5. Eligible equipment and an eligible network provider. You pick both from CALeVIP's lists at submission, for at least four eligible ports. You can change equipment until the 90-day checkpoint, but the program expects you to know your hardware when you apply. The certification requirements behind the equipment list are covered in CALeVIP Window 2's equipment rules.
6. A plan for power if your service falls short. If your utility cannot supply enough capacity for the 150 kW per-port guarantee and you intend to use a utility flexible connection program such as PG&E's Flex Connect, you must tell CALeVIP at least 15 business days before you apply. For an opening-day filing that notice date has already passed, so plan to file later in the window.

Do not start construction before October 7, 2026. The manual cancels any project whose construction began before that date and forfeits its incentive. Eligible design, utility, and other costs can be counted from May 27, 2026 onward, but anything you spend before funds are reserved is at your own risk: until a reservation, no incentive is assigned to the site. Permit fees themselves, security cameras, lighting, fencing, solar panels, and in-house labor are among the costs the program will not reimburse, so they stay in your budget even at a 100% award.

What changed for these windows

Several eligibility rules tightened relative to the first window. CALeVIP's Window 3 page confirms three of them for both windows: charging hubs, hotels, and business districts are no longer eligible site types; the applicant must be both the incentive recipient and the owner of the charging equipment; and applications must be ready to build, with an issued permit and a final utility service design.

The rest of this section comes from the Window 2 Implementation Manual. Window 3 has no manual yet and may or may not carry these rules. CALeVIP can also revise the Window 2 manual during the window, so confirm any single point against the current version before building a plan on it.

• Site types. The Window 2 eligible list is specific: short-term airport parking, casinos, public or private parking lots and garages, colleges and universities, community centers (including parks and trailheads with restrooms), gas stations, grocery and retail stores, retail shopping centers, libraries, medical facilities, places of worship, police or sheriff stations, public transit hubs, and restaurants. Car dealerships, service centers, and other automotive facilities are excluded, and so are sites that already received CALeVIP 2.0 funding.
• Ownership for six years. The manual holds the applicant to owning the charging equipment for the six-year obligation period, so a host-and-lease arrangement where a third party owns the hardware does not fit. The one exception is a parent company and its subsidiaries, which can split those roles only with written approval from CALeVIP and the CEC.
• ENERGY STAR equipment. Funded chargers must be ENERGY STAR certified or hold an approved exemption; chargers above 350 kW are outside ENERGY STAR's scope and may qualify for one.
• Existing, paved sites only. Sites must already be in use with paved parking. New construction is not allowed, and neither are CEQA exemptions. Replacing existing chargers does not qualify.

Connector rules differ between the windows. The September 2026 Window 2 manual lets both CCS and J3400 (the SAE standard for the NACS connector) ports count toward the incentive, as long as at least 50% of the site's charging ports are CCS (the manual uses both "connectors" and "charging ports" for this floor, so confirm the count with CALeVIP). CHAdeMO and other connector types are not allowed on funded equipment. CALeVIP's Window 3 page says J3400 and CCS connectors are eligible there, with one CCS connector required per site.

What the program funds, and who can apply

The Fast Charge California Project funds publicly accessible DC fast charging, and the incentive goes to the organization that owns the chargers, not to drivers. The owner and the site host can be different parties; the site's owners sign the Site Verification Form. Eligible applicants are California-based businesses, sole proprietorships, nonprofits, and government entities (or out-of-state organizations with a California-based affiliate), plus California Native American tribes listed with the Native American Heritage Commission.

A few more requirements shape who realistically qualifies:

• Public access means around the clock. Chargers must be available to the public 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, with signage saying so. Sites whose primary use is a parking lot or garage can instead meet at least 18 hours a day, seven days a week. Chargers behind a gate or fence, or reached only by valet, do not qualify. A charger reserved for tenants, employees, or a fleet does not qualify.
• The 150 kW floor is a per-port guarantee. Equipment must deliver at least 150 kW at each port with all ports in use. A port that cannot guarantee 150 kW is not a "Charging Port" under the program and cannot be funded at any tier. A site with constrained service has two possible routes. One is an established utility flexible connection program, with the notice described above. The other is load management or dynamic power allocation: such sites may receive a limited waiver of the service and equipment sizing requirements at the CEC's discretion, and a waiver may come with a reduced per-port incentive set by the CEC.
• The site host takes on six years of obligations. That includes a networking agreement of at least six years, charging that never requires a subscription or membership, a 97% uptime standard, and session data reporting.

Who runs it, and how the last window performed

CALeVIP is funded through the CEC's Clean Transportation Program and administered by the Center for Sustainable Energy on the CEC's behalf. A parallel CEC block grant, Communities in Charge, is run by CALSTART. If you have worked with one, do not assume the other's portal or rules carry over.

The first Fast Charge California window, open from August 5, 2025 to January 29, 2026, awarded $54 million for more than 1,200 ready-to-build fast charging ports across 35 counties, with more than 60% of those chargers in underserved communities, according to the CEC. It was oversubscribed: CALeVIP held a waitlist for Tier 1 applications it could not fund, and applications still on it after March 14, 2026 were cancelled. Across all of its phases, CALeVIP has supported more than 10,500 charger installations statewide.

Stacking: Window 2 bars utility programs and other CEC money

California projects used to combine a CALeVIP grant with the federal 30C charger credit and a utility make-ready program. Window 2 allows neither. The rules below come from the Window 2 manual; Window 3 is expected to follow them, but no Window 3 source addresses stacking yet.

The 30C credit ended June 30, 2026, and equipment funded through Window 2 will be placed in service long after that date.

Utility make-ready programs are still funded, but the Window 2 manual prohibits combining them, or most other incentive money, with the grant. It names the prohibited co-funders directly: other California Energy Commission funding, whether block grants or competitive solicitations and from any CEC division; investor-owned utility charger programs, with SCE's Charge Ready 2 named as an example; publicly owned utility programs; community choice aggregator rebates; air district programs, with the Bay Area and San Joaquin Valley districts named; and NEVI. The list is written as "includes, but is not limited to," so it is a floor rather than a complete inventory.

A violation does not reduce the award by a percentage. At its sole and absolute discretion, the administrator can recoup the grant in an amount equal to the stacked funds, plus the costs of collecting it, and the liability stays with the incentive recipient. You cannot contract it away to a developer or a charge point operator; the manual says third-party contract terms do not change your obligations.

The manual allows these exceptions alongside a Window 2 award:

• Low Carbon Fuel Standard revenue.
• Federal funding, including federal tax credits and incentives, except any federal funds administered by the CEC. That exception is what pulls NEVI back into the prohibited column in California, since California's NEVI money runs through the CEC.
• Utility Tariff Rules 29 and 45, which pay for utility-side infrastructure. These are tariff provisions, not the utility incentive programs that are prohibited, and the two are easy to confuse. Confirm which one your utility is offering before you count on it. How the tariff rules and the make-ready programs differ is covered in Utility Make-Ready Programs.
• Local government funds for costs the rebate does not cover. A local government applicant can use local, state, or federal money for those costs, as long as the money does not come from an EV charging incentive or rebate program.
• Other funding applied to costs FCCP does not cover, up to 100% of overall project cost, with no profit to the applicant.

If a utility make-ready program is the better deal for your site, take it instead; you cannot have both on the same installation. If the same address applies to FCCP and NEVI, whichever program processes first reserves the funding; the applicant does not choose. Cancelling an FCCP application after funds are reserved in order to take NEVI counts against you as a poor performer on future rounds.

A grant excluded from taxable income can also reduce the cost basis you claim under a federal credit, so a grant and a credit do not always add up to their combined face value. With 30C ended, this does not affect Window 2 or Window 3 projects; it applies to any future project that qualifies for a federal credit. The full set of stacking rules is worked through in Stacking Incentives, and California's place among other state programs is in State Grant Programs.

Deciding whether to file in Window 2

If you control an eligible public site and you already hold, or are days away from, an issued permit and a final utility service design, file in Window 2 as early as your package allows. The queue is first come, first served, the last window ran out of money before it ran out of applicants, and $27.6 million covers roughly 276 ports at the full $100,000 cap, or about 500 at $55,000.

If you are still waiting on your utility, Window 2 remains open until January 14, 2027, and Window 3 follows in February. The utility service design is the long pole in any California DC fast charging project, and the program will not accept an application that is not ready to build, so start that process now whichever window you target.

Two further steps:

1. Model the project before you commit. A four-port DC fast charging station is a major capital decision even at 100% of eligible costs, because the cap is per port and not every cost is eligible. Run your own numbers with the Commercial ROI Snapshot before you assume the grant covers the whole project.
2. Check the full incentive picture for your address. California layers state, utility, and local programs unevenly by territory. Start with the California state guide and the Incentive Stack Estimator, remembering that most of what they surface cannot be combined with this grant.

A short checklist before you count on a CALeVIP window

• Confirmed your site type is on the Window 2 eligible list (not a charging hub, hotel, business district, or automotive facility) and the site has not already received CALeVIP 2.0 funding
• Confirmed the site is already in use with paved parking and can be open to the public 24 hours a day (18 hours for a site whose primary use is parking)
• Confirmed you will own the charging equipment, not just host it
• Have an issued permit, or know the date you will
• Have a final utility service design or a no-new-service letter, or know the date you will
• Put the same legal name and tax ID on the application, permit, utility documents, and contracts
• Have the Site Verification Form signed by you, the property owner, and the site owner
• Construction has not started and will not start before October 7, 2026
• Checked whether every charger sits in a disadvantaged community, low-income community, or on tribal land, if you are counting on priority
• Checked which Window 2 tier your ports land in, using guaranteed output with all ports in use, not nameplate
• Picked equipment from CALeVIP's eligible list, with at least 50% of the site's charging ports CCS and no CHAdeMO
• Confirmed the chargers are ENERGY STAR certified or exempt
• Lined up a vendor who can accept a purchase order in your own name within 90 days of reservation
• Confirmed no prohibited co-funder is in your budget: no other CEC funding, no investor-owned or publicly owned utility charger program, no CCA rebate, no air district program, no NEVI
• Re-read the current Implementation Manual on calevip.org the day you apply, because CALeVIP can revise it during the window

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Last factually verified: September 30, 2026, against the California Energy Commission's May 28, 2026 announcement; the Fast Charge California Project 2 Implementation Manual (dated September 18, 2026) and the Window 2 program page on calevip.org; CALeVIP's Window 3 program page; CALeVIP's first-window (FCCP-1) program page; and Charged EVs' June 1, 2026 coverage of the announcement. The $27.6 million Window 2 figure comes from the Implementation Manual; the $55.2 million figure is the CEC's total for both windows. The CALeVIP upcoming-rebates page returned an access error to this research pass; nothing above depends on it. evcharginghelp.com is editorially independent and receives no compensation from any company mentioned.

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Corrections (September 30, 2026): This article previously said that at least 50% of CALeVIP incentives must go to chargers serving low-income, disadvantaged, and tribal communities. The Window 2 manual sets no such allocation; it gives processing priority to applications with every charger in those areas and sets no regional or community quota. It also said the 50 active project limit counted CALeVIP 1.0 projects; the manual counts CALeVIP 2.0 and Communities in Charge. The unpaved-site CEQA point has been restated: the manual bars CEQA exemptions for all Window 2 sites and requires existing paved parking.

Corrections (August 14, 2026): This article previously said that utility make-ready programs from PG&E, SCE, and SDG&E still stack with a CALeVIP Fast Charge California award. They do not. FCCP-2 names investor-owned utility charger programs among its prohibited co-funders, and improper stacking is recouped dollar for dollar from the participant. The section has been rewritten to state the prohibition and to list the actual carve-outs, which are LCFS revenue, non-CEC federal funding, Utility Tariff Rules 29 and 45, and funding applied to costs FCCP does not cover.