Charging in strata and office buildings

As EV popularity grows, the demand for EV chargers will increase, including the EV chargers placed within multi-storey apartment blocks. The Commonwealth Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water (DCCEEW) has a guide for installing EV chargers for building owners corporations. The guide is designed to support owners corporations to make their buildings ‘EV ready’. DCCEEW also has a guide for installing a personal EV charger for strata building residents, which is designed to support the residents.

The Department of Energy, Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety has supported amendments to the National Construction Code (NCC) to include a requirement that new buildings are EV ready. The Australian Building Codes Board (ABCB) revised the NCC in 2022 to enable several building classes – including units, offices, shops and other public buildings – to be easily fitted with distributed energy resources equipment, such as electrical distribution boards dedicated to EV charging, to support future EV uptake.

An advisory note on EV charging was published by the ABCB and can be found on their website EV charging – Making it easy. Making it safe. | NCC (abcb.gov.au) which describes the minimum requirements for EV-charging equipment in new buildings.

The Western Australian Building Regulations 2012 have been amended, making these provisions available for voluntary adoption in WA from October 2023, and mandatory application starting 1 May 2025.

Western Power offers information to assist homeowners and electricians connect an EV charger to the network. This covers both single direction and bidirectional chargers that can feed electricity from an EV back into the home or grid.