Estimation of vehicle home parking availability in China and quantification of its potential impacts on plug-in electric vehicle ownership cost

China has become the world's largest plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) market. One major barrier to greater consumer acceptance of PEVs is the lack of home parking spaces for charging outlets. This study developed a methodology to estimate the residential parking ratios (parking spaces vs household numbers) and project the residential community-weighted parking availabilities (home parking availabilities) in China, by area and by province, through data mining from several major real estate trading network platforms. The results show that the home parking availabilities from 2015 to 2050 vary by geographic areas and building life expectancy. A method was developed to quantify the shadow values of home parking impacting on PEV ownership costs and combined with Monte Carlo simulation to address estimation uncertainty. Depending on the PEV type and all-electric range, the value of home parking space to a PEV owner, measured by the reduced vehicle ownership cost, ranges from $2399 USD to $10,802 USD. The total incremental shadow value, relative to the 2015 situation, of the home parking availability for PEV owners increases over time due to both improvement in home parking availability and increase in the PEV population, and is estimated to reach over $2.51 billion USD by 2025 (U.S. dollars in 2015 level).