Exploring the utilization of Electric-vehicles’ free public charging facilities in small towns. A case of the town of Cary, North Carolina

•We explored the utilization of publicly available electric vehicle (EV) charging stations.•We utilized the four year of EV energy consumption data from town of Cary, North Carolina.•We found that for each charging minute, the EV consumed between 87 and 111.3 Wh of energy.•A great variation in charging duration and energy consumed was observed across the hours, days, and locations.•The findings can help the deployment of charging facilities based on the expected utilization. This study explores the influence of spatial–temporal factors on the utilization of publicly available electric vehicle (EV) charging stations. It utilized the EV energy consumption data collected between 2019 and 2022 from six charging locations in the town of Cary, North Carolina. Descriptive analysis, multiple linear regression, and survival models were applied to explore energy consumption and the charging duration. Study results revealed a great variation in energy consumption and charging duration. Sundays have the highest frequency of charging activities, the largest amount of energy consumed, and the longest total duration, while Mondays have the lowest frequency of charging activities. Most of the charging activities occurred between 6 a.m. and 9p.m. The relationship between charging duration and energy consumed revealed that, for each charging minute, the EV consumed between 87 and 111.3 Wh of energy. The observed variations were mainly associated with the location of a charging facility and charging model type. The regression model results revealed that, unlike nighttime, energy consumption is statistically significantly lower in the daytime. Exploration of the day of the week suggested that weekdays, especially Mondays and Thursdays, have higher energy consumption than weekends. Further, the energy consumption increased over time, as indicated by the higher energy consumed in 2022 compared to 2019. The pattern for charging duration is similar to that of energy consumption except for the days of the week. The findings are crucial to planners for better planning and deployment of charging facilities based on the expected utilization.