[HN Gopher] Tesla to open some superchargers to other vehicles
___________________________________________________________________
Tesla to open some superchargers to other vehicles
Author : mfiguiere
Score : 72 points
Date : 2023-02-15 15:14 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.wsj.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.wsj.com)
| steveBK123 wrote:
| Will be interesting to see how this rolls out. Former Tesla,
| current CCS charging EV owner myself.
|
| Most assume it will basically be accomplished by exclusively
| building out new locations with the new "magic dock" CCS adapter.
|
| Even this is fine with me given that Tesla not only has far more
| stations than CCS competition in US, but they are also building
| out new stations more rapidly too.. so the lead only grows. Also
| note that every Tesla location is 8+ stalls, often up to 16
| stalls, and I'd say the average location is now 12 stalls.. and
| they all work 99.9% of the time. EA/evGo/etc CCS networks tend to
| install pathetic 4 stall stations that have perpetually 1 or more
| stalls out of service.
|
| 3500 chargers / 12 charger average location = under 300
| locations, vs total existing ~1700 current locations.
|
| For those complaining about Tesla gaming this or something, I'd
| point more of a finger at the CCS networks who are installing the
| minimally compliant (4 stall) locations at an alarmingly slow
| rate. They are leaving money on the table, and giving customers a
| bad experience. Happy to see Tesla come in and give them a run
| for the money.
| vel0city wrote:
| > given that Tesla not only has far more stations than CCS
| competition in US
|
| Given you've said "stations" separately from "stalls", this is
| not true.
|
| https://afdc.energy.gov/fuels/electricity_locations.html#/fi...
|
| 6,134 results for DC Fast CCS chargers, 1,841 results for DC
| Fast Tesla.
|
| There are more Tesla stalls, but there are fewer locations.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| Better comparison via the websites-
|
| http://fastcharger.info
|
| https://supercharge.info
|
| Or you can use a site with more advanced filters like
| https://www.plugshare.com
| vel0city wrote:
| So fastcharger.info states there are >4,000 open CCS
| locations in the US and Canada (their "global" data is just
| US+Canada).
|
| http://fastcharger.info/charts
|
| ~1,200 of those listed were 150kW+. Another 300 or so are
| 100kW+. So 1,500 of those being in the same ballpark as
| average Tesla charging speeds.
|
| The supercharge.info states there are ~1,900 open Tesla
| locations in North America.
|
| https://supercharge.info/charts
|
| Of that, some percentage of those are 120kW and 72kW.
| They're not all 250kW chargers. I can't sort by kW on that
| site's data and I'm not interested enough to skim/export it
| to find the exact number, but just eyeballing several pages
| makes me thing probably 5-10% of those as <250kW. Its not
| like all superchargers on the road are 250kW chargers.
|
| So by your own data sets you've shared, for "open"
| chargers, there are more CCS locations than Tesla.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| For example, on an 85mi drive I frequently take, for a wide
| definition of "on the way", inclusive of 5-10mi detours off
| highway, there are:
|
| Total 25 CCS stalls with 120kW+ charging vs 118 Tesla
| stalls on the same route
|
| From experience I also know the Tesla stalls will be 99.9%
| up whereas the CCS ones will be 75-90% on any given date.
|
| "25 stalls in 85mi" might to a non-EV owner sound like
| fine, quite a lot, but think about that as like.. only
| having 3 gas stations within a 2 hour drive, in the most
| congested, population dense area of the US.
|
| Not great.
| vel0city wrote:
| I do agree CCS networks need to work on uptime, even 90%
| availability per stall is unacceptable to me.
|
| However, there's probably more than 4x the number of
| Teslas versus CCS cars on the road today in the US.
| What's the ratio of Tesla cars/Tesla stalls vs CCS
| cars/CCS stalls on that route currently? If there's 118
| Tesla stalls that are constantly in use versus 25 which
| are rarely used, which is going to be easier to find a
| place to charge right away?
|
| So counting the stalls seems to be a bit of a misnomer to
| me at this point. Maybe if CCS cars was a similar number
| on the roads, but in the end as a CCS user I care more
| about there being more locations and uptime than having
| more stalls that sit empty all the time.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| I have a CCS car, and I love it, but this is despite the
| charging network not because of it.
|
| The ratio of cars:chargers is probably pretty good, or
| maybe even better for CCS, in a perverse way because
| Tesla has such a sales lead.
|
| Unfortunately CCS networks in the Northeast tend to
| install themselves well off the highway in back corners
| of giant shopping center or mall parking lots.
|
| Route I used to take on my Tesla without leaving the
| highway, or only needing to leave the highway for 1 mile,
| instead require large detours for CCS.
|
| NJTP for example has been a mess for CCS by compare,
| though it should be better, eventually, with the EvGo
| partnership. I95/Rt15 through CT is similarly very bad.
| vel0city wrote:
| I agree location choices could be better. I'm happy that
| my state's plans for charging infrastructure grants
| really push new charging developments immediately at the
| highway exits and other good locations. It will be nice
| to see that happen, as often times on road trips it did
| take me driving an extra mile or two into the town to the
| Walmart or other shopping center to plug in instead of
| being right on my planned route.
|
| In the end though I do expect for CCS to just become
| pretty ubiquitous. You won't need many big 10+ stall
| stations, because there will be so many smaller 2-4 stall
| stations all over the place.There aren't yet the
| customers to support that amount of infrastructure today
| though, but as more EVs come to market and Teslas at
| least having CCS adapters it'll become more of a thing.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| OK I probably am putting on blinders and mixing some words
| up.. But the problem with CCS is a lot of these stats count
| BS unnetworked, poorly maintained, single-stalls 50kW
| stations sitting in car dealer parking lots only usable
| 9a-5p, and stuff like that.
|
| Checking the ones on the map near me, and it includes a bunch
| of CCS stations I've never seen actually working, stuff in
| government parking lots not available to public, and lots and
| lots of dealer special chargers which are of limited access..
|
| If you were able to filter on "150kW+ L3 charging" the 6k
| number would probably drop to 2-3k maybe best case. Which
| would result in something like 2.5k stations x 4 stalls =>
| 10k CCS stalls, vs 1.8k Tesla stations x 12 stalls = 22k
| stalls.
| vel0city wrote:
| Isn't 2.5-3.0 still a larger number than 1.8?
|
| I'm definitely not arguing CCS has more stalls, as I do
| agree most CCS deployments are like 2-4 stalls while the
| average Tesla one is like 8 and its somewhat common to find
| stations with 10+.
|
| In the end, you said there are more "stations", and made a
| clear delineation of "stations" vs "stalls". This is
| incorrect, there are more CCS _stations_ than Tesla. There
| are probably way more Tesla stalls, I 'm pretty sure.
| hedora wrote:
| Minimum compliance with this law is driving me nuts as a car
| owner.
|
| Tesla isn't the only villian. The credit card payment systems are
| routinely broken -- tap to pay, chip and swipe all fail in
| different ways (especially with EVgo)
|
| This should be all or nothing -- 99.9% uptime on compatibility
| with standard cars and payment methods, fleet wide, or you get
| zero dollars.
|
| Unreliable is worse than unsupported, and the interoperability
| clauses of the law apparently don't mandate reliability.
| cowmix wrote:
| Electrify America's network is pretty bad, top to bottom.
| Payment processing is just the tip of the iceberg in how much
| it blows.
| hedora wrote:
| Yeah. My favorite part is that the payment processing state
| machine inevitably leads to the "not charging, locked in
| place" state, so I have to hang around for a few minutes
| until my car computer's self defense logic kicks in, flips
| the bozo bit on the connector and releases the lock.
| bdcravens wrote:
| I believe my Kia EV6 has an emergency release inside of the
| trunk area.
| oakwhiz wrote:
| This could have been avoided if the charging port had a
| manual disconnect switch next to it, rated to handle the
| arcing at full power. Auxiliary contacts can then release
| it and tell the computer that you manually killed the port.
| I dislike this "computer exclusively in the loop" design
| methodology.
| martythemaniak wrote:
| There is no law that requires compliance here, only incentives.
| Tesla has chosen to respond to incentives.
| hedora wrote:
| Yes, and they should not be paid because they are half assing
| the compliance (as are many of the other charging networks).
| jackmott42 wrote:
| Don't let perfect be the enemy of good.
| frumper wrote:
| What are they non-compliant about? It was announced today
| sliken wrote:
| I've had a Tesla model 3, since 2019. Every time I used the car
| to get to a Tesla charger it worked, zero to a few times a
| month. Success rate at 3rd party chargers has been about 50%.
|
| Sure that's anecdotal, but I read a few (more than 1 each)
| reviews on the Harley Davidson Livewire, Ford Mach-E, and Ford
| f150 lightning. All had charging issues during their review.
|
| After owning a EV for years, my only range anxiety is caused by
| having to use non-Tesla chargers.
| dagmx wrote:
| I've definitely encountered some bad Tesla chargers. It used
| to be much worse before they added the data to the system
| about which stalls are encountering issues though. Now it's
| much rarer to be directed to a broken charger.
| jackmott42 wrote:
| Have had a model 3 for about 1.5 years now, supercharged
| maybe 50 times. One bad stall. Not bad!
| bdcravens wrote:
| In a cross-country trip, many EA stations had more or one
| charger not working in some way, but they all had a least one
| functional. Likewise, drive up to any random gas station, and
| it's not uncommon to see at least one with a plastic bag over
| the nozzle, and those card readers fail as well (to say
| nothing of the risk of skimmers)
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| Gas stations can handle a broken pump or two because even
| urban locations typically have 4-6 pumps and busy highways
| have more. Moreover, filling takes 3-4 minutes at max.
|
| Having one working charger at a highway-adjacent station
| could mean literally hours of waiting on a busy day,
| especially if you're waiting for a 50kW vehicle. Even if
| you get lucky most of the time, just the _possibility_ of a
| multi-hour wait time would make most drives impractical.
| bearjaws wrote:
| Gas station pumps being out are acceptable when time to
| refill is sub 3 minutes.
|
| A single stall being out can mean someone waiting 15+
| minutes, but some stations are so busy that it could easily
| lead to a line of cars.
|
| Additionally since level 3 chargers are pivotal to road
| trips, people aren't casually stopping by them 'to top up',
| they usually are down to <50 miles of range when they stop,
| meaning continuing on may actually be impossible depending
| location of next charging station.
| hedora wrote:
| I've had zero issues with charging my i3. The problem is
| getting it to accept payment via my amex/master card/visa.
|
| For example, the chip reader pins on the EVgo's are corroded
| around here, so you need to wiggle the credit card in the
| reader and hope it manages to handshake with the embedded
| smart card. (If it is a Visa or Master Card.) If AMEX or
| Discover, they require you to swipe the mag strip, which
| would be useful if the mag strip reader didn't spuriously
| decline payment.
|
| There is also an rfid reader labeled "present phone", but it
| doesn't work with apple pay, the EVgo app (android or ios) or
| the rfid tags in any of my credit cards.
| CrazyStat wrote:
| If you can't charge because the station won't accept
| payment, that's an issue charging.
|
| It sounds like you've had a lot of issues with charging
| your i3.
| snotrockets wrote:
| Something I just realized, is that Tesla chargers are broken
| 100% of the time for some people.
|
| Drivers with disabilities that prevent them from operating a
| gas pump by themselves can call an attendant at the station,
| but Tesla chargers has nobody on site.
| mlindner wrote:
| Tesla doesn't have this problem though so how are they the
| villain? Tesla created the first global charger network that
| now other companies are pleading for government help to compete
| with.
| hedora wrote:
| They are moving to a model where they get billions of dollars
| in government hand outs to support third party cars, but are
| not going to actually reliably allow third party cars to
| change. (Just like other networks are taking money to support
| standard payments, but don't in practice.)
| mlindner wrote:
| I'm not following. Who is moving to such a model?
|
| Yes Tesla should be paid if they're being forced to
| subsidize their competitors. The entire point of Tesla's
| charging system is that it's non-profit making. It's based
| on the idea that it's acts as a value-add to Tesla
| vehicles. If Tesla is going to allow access to competitors,
| then yes Tesla needs to be paid for that access, or charge
| differential rates between Tesla and non-Tesla vehicles.
| clouddrover wrote:
| > _Yes Tesla should be paid if they 're being forced to
| subsidize their competitors_
|
| The way Tesla gets paid is by users paying for the
| charge. It isn't complicated.
| mlindner wrote:
| Tesla prices are usually cheaper than any other EV
| charging station (or free). From my understanding they
| charge a little bit above local electricity rates enough
| to cover maintenance costs.
|
| Are you making the argument that non-Teslas should be
| charged more than Tesla users. I'm fine with that but I
| think that wouldn't be allowed under this new provision.
| [deleted]
| ericmay wrote:
| Based on the OP I'm really not following this line of
| reasoning here.
|
| The billions of dollars that are available aren't only to
| Tesla.
|
| Tesla actually reliably accepts and processes credit card
| payments without issues, unlike the anecdotes provided by
| others here with other charging networks and there is no
| reason to think that Tesla would no longer reliably accept
| payments given that they intentionally accept payments from
| all major credit card processors.
|
| Why would they not allow 3rd-party cars to charge? They may
| have some prioritization scheme for Tesla vehicles, but
| other than that I'm just not following what you are saying
| here.
| vel0city wrote:
| If I were to go to a Tesla station in the US today with
| my non-Tesla car, it would not charge.
| ericmay wrote:
| And why is that relevant to the conversation at hand?
| vel0city wrote:
| > Why would they not allow 3rd-party cars to charge?
|
| Tesla isn't allowing my car to charge. They have a
| proprietary plug and a proprietary payment protocol. So
| if I drove my car to a Tesla stall in the US right now,
| it would not charge as it is not a Tesla. Why would they
| not, well, because for the past few years they've used
| their proprietary network as a marketing advantage.
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| Tesla chargers have been open to other cars in Norway since
| last year and I see many non-Teslas charging. They don't
| seem to have a problem doing it. You just need to install
| the Tesla app on your phone and register a credit card
| number with it.
| MagnumOpus wrote:
| Snark: millions of petrol stations and vending machines
| manage to accept contactless or card payment without
| having to install the vendor's app.
| firmnoodle wrote:
| I couldn't find that Tesla will receive "billions"
| anywhere. Only that the US Federal government is giving $5B
| to states and Tesla is applying for some of that money.
| Where do you see that Tesla won't reliably allow third
| party cars to charge?
| maherbeg wrote:
| I've been a model 3 owner for 4+ years and have cross country
| road tripped multiple times. The charging infrastructure for
| Tesla is just consistently reliable and continually getting
| better. Sometimes we ran into a charger stall not working, but
| most stations had lots of stalls that we could retry at a
| different one.
|
| The consistency of non-Tesla chargers is pretty poor and really
| puts a damper in the potential growth of the EV market. We went
| through an annoying charging fiasco at a chargepoint station that
| I'm not sure how non-technical people would get past.
| Additionally, the next day the EA station we needed to goto ended
| up being completely down!
| maherbeg wrote:
| Also, the Tesla connector is just so much better than the CCS
| connectors in North America. It feels so seamless to get it
| connected to the car and feel like you have a solid connection.
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| What does the connector have to do with it? All new Tesla
| chargers in Europe are CCS and I haven't heard of anyone
| having any problems with it.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| Many people I've seen use a Type 1 CCS connector seems to
| feel the need to wiggle it in/out as I watch on in
| horror... and I've struggled to decouple the CCS connector
| on multiple occasions (imagine a gas pump nozzle getting
| stuck and how frustrating that would be with no staff
| around).
|
| Though take this with a grain of salt, as I have no
| firsthand experience with other connector types.
| Arrath wrote:
| > (imagine a gas pump nozzle getting stuck and how
| frustrating that would be with no staff around)
|
| I ran into this! Some recent MY's of Dodge Ram trucks had
| a weird angle with their filler neck and the pump
| nozzle[1] would get well and truly stuck. I had a 2018
| Ram 1500 provided by work, and quickly learned what local
| gas stations were decent and which ones I had to avoid,
| lest I spend a few minutes really reefing on the nozzle
| to get it to come loose, worrying i'll break something
| the whole time.
|
| [1]Vapor reclamation style pump nozzles, that is. Plain
| old straight nozzles were fine.
|
| See:
|
| https://www.classaction.org/media/kingston-v-fca-us-
| llc.pdf
|
| "Specifically, Defendant's defective fuel tank filler
| necks1 (the "Filler Neck Defect") cause standard gas-
| station nozzles--which work perfectly well with other
| vehicles--to become lodged in the opening to Dodge Ram
| fuel tanks, forcing Dodge Ram owners to either physically
| wrench the gas nozzle free, contact their roadside
| assistance provider (if they have one) to have the nozzle
| dislodged, or even call their local fire department for
| help."
| maherbeg wrote:
| We just went through this process of it not connecting
| just perfectly enough, and then not being able to easily
| disconnect it afterwards.
| jp191919 wrote:
| Type1 CCS vs Type 2 CCS?
| maherbeg wrote:
| In North America, I believe it's the Type 1 connector.
| ajross wrote:
| There's a difference between "not having problems with it"
| and "good product" though.
|
| I mean, in 2012 there were people claiming that there was
| nothing wrong with Micro-USB and that the Lightning
| connector was just silly and incompatible. They weren't
| "wrong" exactly, but... no, they were basically wrong.
| Apple provided a vastly better charging experience.
|
| But in the USB case, the industry recognized that fact and
| cloned the important features into the still-not-perfect-
| but-really-very-much-improved C plug. With CCS, everyone is
| still sitting around with their heads in the same hole they
| dug a decade ago when they rejected Tesla[1].
|
| It's just a bad product and a bad standard. It just is.
|
| [1] And also CHAdeMO, itself superior to CCS. Really this
| was the real reason for CCS, it was an attempt by western
| auto manufacturers to preempt the threat they perceived
| from Nissan. As it happens the threat was more real than
| they knew, but they had the wrong villain in mind.
| vel0city wrote:
| CHAdeMO is not better to CCS in the slightest. Having two
| entirely different receptacles on a car is not better
| than having one with two extra pins at the bottom for the
| few times DCFC is necessary.
| ajross wrote:
| I don't see how that follows at all. In fact CCS is
| _literally_ two unrelated connectors glued together.
| Plugging in a CCS car means that you have to manage to
| get both inserted simultaneously, which is _worse_ than
| either in isolation, that seems true just by
| construction.
|
| Seriously, just go to youtube and find videos of people
| plugging in their cars. Watch them fumble with a CCS
| connector for 5+ seconds, using two hands, almost every
| time. Plugging in a Tesla is instant, and one-handed.
| CHAdeMO is in between.
|
| Obviously it would be better still if you could share the
| connectors for both purposes like Tesla does.
| vel0city wrote:
| CHAdeMO does not handle AC charging, at all. So for a car
| with a CHAdeMO connector, I'll _need_ some kind of AC
| charger for my home.
|
| In ths US, this AC charging, Level 2, is handled by
| J1772. So for a car in the US with CHAdeMO, I'll have a
| J1772 plug, _and_ then this whole other CHAdeMO connector
| which is again the same size as the J1772 connector.
|
| Or, I just add two pins at the bottom of the J1772 plug,
| and call it CCS.
|
| And yeah, maybe it would have been better for it to be
| like the Tesla connector and have the same pins used for
| HVDC and AC power. But in a large family of makers using
| the plug it seems pretty risky reusing pins for HVDC and
| high amperage AC systems. Tesla can manage it because for
| Tesla only Tesla makes Tesla, but in a much larger
| network who knows what might happen.
| ajross wrote:
| > So for a car in the US with CHAdeMO, I'll have a J1772
| plug, and then this whole other CHAdeMO connector
|
| And I repeat: for a CCS[1] car, you have a J-1772
| connector, _and_ a DC connector both on the car and both
| taking up space. And it 's worse, because they're glued
| together! Going back to my USB example, imagine if USB-C
| worked by having a USB3 and USB2 connector side by side,
| and you couldn't charge your phone or connect your mouse
| without using both.
|
| It's literally that bad, and I genuinely can't imagine
| why you think otherwise. Have you ever actually plugged a
| Tesla in?
|
| [1] Strictly CCS Combo 1 as deployed in North America.
| Europeans get an IEC connector glued on instead. Which
| brings up the other bit of CCS madness: it's not even one
| standard, it's two completely incompatible plug designs
| with the same name!
| vel0city wrote:
| It still takes up more space and creates more
| complications on the car. Look at how much space J1772 +
| CHAdeMO takes up on a car and compare that to CCS.
|
| https://picolio.auto123.com/art-
| images/156317/chademo_connec...
|
| vs
|
| https://cdn.motor1.com/images/mgl/PYwkW/s3/european-ccs-
| type...
|
| Which is a more compact solution to a _whole_ charging
| system on the car?
|
| For CCS vs CHAdeMO, I'd take CCS every time. I don't want
| to have two completely separate plugs, I'd prefer just
| one plug. If you can't look at these two pictures above
| and understand what I'm talking about, I don't know what
| to tell you.
|
| I've plugged in Teslas. I've plugged in CCS. I've handled
| CHAdeMO cables, which were roughly the same size and
| flexibility as the CCS ones on the stalls. I do agree
| Tesla connectors were the easiest to work with, but Tesla
| continuing to put it behind their patent pledge means
| nobody else is going to really use it. I do wish they
| would have _actually_ opened it up or licensed it under
| some normal kind of licensing terms, but they didn 't, so
| we're left with the standard the rest of the market came
| up with.
|
| As for CCS being different in the US vs Europe, I guess
| I'll have an issue if I drive my EV across the Atlantic
| Ocean. I'm not planning on making that road trip anytime
| soon, so I don't think that'll be an issue for me. If I
| move to Europe, I'd probably just sell my car and buy
| something over there rather than deal with import duties
| and getting it compliant to EU standards and what not,
| and vice-versa.
| clouddrover wrote:
| > _it 's not even one standard, it's two completely
| incompatible plug designs with the same name!_
|
| Tesla has had five different plug designs on its cars.
| It's apparently not the problem you think it is.
| clouddrover wrote:
| > _And also CHAdeMO, itself superior to CCS._
|
| CHAdeMO could never charge at the rates CCS can.
| CHAdeMO's old plug has also been dropped for CHAdeMO 3.0.
| CHAdeMO 3.0 is a new plug and port design.
| jackmott42 wrote:
| The CCS connector is "fine", the Tesla one is just better.
| It is way smaller where the CCS is a big chungus and
| unwieldy, and the tesla one you just stick it in, where the
| CCS you kinda have to work to get it to "click" and you can
| think its connected when it isn't.
| realworldperson wrote:
| [dead]
| bragr wrote:
| [flagged]
| nxm wrote:
| It's PR for the White House to all of the sudden transform the
| national charging network and make EV ownership easier.
| NickM wrote:
| The White House is doing PR for itself first and foremost here.
| Tesla did a good thing as a result of laws that have been
| recently passed that incentivize it, and the White House wants
| to make sure people know it.
| mlindner wrote:
| The current White House has been anti-Tesla since the beginning
| so I've got no clue what you're talking about.
| andsoitis wrote:
| in what concrete way has the current WH been anti-Tesla? i'm
| aware of the WH not praising tesla while they praised ford
| (iirc), but, notwithstanding complaints by Elon's mom that he
| isn't appreciated, I'm not aware of any action against Tesla
| per se.
| mlindner wrote:
| Praising competitors, refusing to invite Tesla to EV
| events, working with lobbyists from competitors in this
| recent law, actively lying to the media about which company
| caused the EV number explosion that we've seen, and
| generally trying to pretend very hard that Tesla doesn't
| even exist.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| Stuff like this: https://electrek.co/2021/08/06/tesla-
| wasnt-invited-biden-ev-...
|
| As well as claiming that GM/Mary Barra "electrified the
| nation".
| andsoitis wrote:
| I mean, Tesla is already 100% electric so the emphasis is
| on incentivizing / forcing the other automakers to
| accelerate electrification. When we think about it, they
| sell way more cars than Tesla, so from a practical point
| of view you want to move them. Besides forcing (laws,
| emmissions standards) you can also praise them foe their
| work in order to get them more on the electrification
| agenda.
|
| Praising Tesla wouldn't increase electrification, so
| doesn't seem worth doing unless it would stoke sufficient
| envy to encourage other automakers.
|
| Sour grapes about not being praised seems more an ego
| thing.
| mlindner wrote:
| Why do we need to save other automakers from their own
| destruction who refuse to adapt?
|
| > Praising Tesla wouldn't increase electrification, so
| doesn't seem worth doing unless it would stoke sufficient
| envy to encourage other automakers.
|
| Sure it will. It'll indicate that there's political
| support for Tesla and that other automakers should copy
| Tesla.
| cowmix wrote:
| I'm not a super fan of Musk lately but the White House has done
| zero PR for Tesla since Biden took office. This is first.
| ec109685 wrote:
| Feels unfortunate the less popular and larger CCS standard is the
| one mandated: https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/11/23453587/tesla-
| connector...
| sschueller wrote:
| They should have mandated CCS2 like Europe.
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| Quite a few Tesla charging stations have been open to other
| brands since last year here in Norway and several other countries
| in Europe. The Wall Street Journal seems to be unaware that other
| countries exist.
| TrainedMonkey wrote:
| > but in the U.S. they aren't available to other types of
| vehicles.
|
| They have a short note in the article, but I agree a better
| callout that this is about U.S. chargers would enhance clarity.
| kube-system wrote:
| Imagine if Ford has their own gas pumps with a different shaped
| connector and you could only fill Fords at their gas stations. I
| applaud Tesla for building the network to support their cars, but
| just like gas stations are critical transportation
| infrastructure, so are vehicle chargers. They shouldn't be legal
| to be used as anticompetitive leverage.
| brianwawok wrote:
| Imagine if Ford paid billions of dollars to build their gas
| pump network. Why should Toyota get to use it?
| mrguyorama wrote:
| Because there are finite resources on earth and we should
| strive for efficient uses of them, not for maximum Ford
| profit. Corporations only exist at society's pleasure, thanks
| the the support of society's government and the property law
| that government applies using it's monopoly on violence.
| There is no right to profit.
| arsome wrote:
| Okay, so Tesla has no or significantly more limited reason
| to build out a charging network. Good job, you made
| electric cars worse, thanks government.
| kube-system wrote:
| Why not? The incentive for building the network was
| always to sell cars. They also make money by selling
| electricity. Neither of those would change. Gas stations
| fill any car, and they still exist.
| kube-system wrote:
| Because abusing a market leading position to tie or bundle
| your products is illegal anticompetitive behavior.
| snotrockets wrote:
| European regulators forced Tesla to play nice. US regulators
| were asleep at the wheel.
| jjtheblunt wrote:
| I think Tesla shipped before regulators started waking up (to
| use your analogy)
| Vespasian wrote:
| Initially Tesla used different connectors in Germany as
| well.
|
| Early Model S were not CCS if I recall correctly.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| The final NEVI charger rules are available here:
| https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/nevi/resources/ev_charg...
|
| Among other things, it requires 97% uptime, CCS connectors, 150
| kW minimum for every plug (power sharing allowed for capacity
| above that), payment via contactless credit/debit payment and
| either toll free phone number or SMS short code, must have a
| customer service system to report charger outages.
| hedora wrote:
| Does the 97% uptime rule also apply to contactless payments? If
| so, that's huge. (EVgo stations around here have 99% uptime on
| the charger, and under 50% on non-app payments.)
| sokoloff wrote:
| 150 kW minimum simultaneously across all DCFCs is likely to
| have an unintended side-effect of limiting the number of DCFCs
| offered.
|
| Which would you rather have, 150kW max per port, 300kW max
| total and 6 DCFCs or the same power limit and only 2 DCFCs?
| ajross wrote:
| That's surely a grandfather rule designed to permit older
| units to qualify. In point of fact all the Tesla stations
| under discussion are v3 250 kW chargers providing full power
| to every port.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| Does this mean that non-Tesla drivers won't have to install the
| Tesla app to use the new Tesla chargers? If so, this is even
| bigger news.
| mlindner wrote:
| There's nothing that says you won't also need a phone app
| just that you can't mandate payment through the phone app. It
| just says that there's no membership requirement and
| downloading an app is not a membership.
|
| BTW, Tesla has already created the technology they'll use for
| charging. It's called "Magic Dock" which is believed to a
| system where through the phone app you either unlock a
| connector that has CCS on the end of it, or you unlock the
| inner Tesla connector. By default it's the Tesla connector
| and you use the Tesla app to tell it that a non-Tesla car has
| arrived. Here's some industry speculation:
| https://www.autoevolution.com/news/here-s-how-tesla-s-
| magic-...
| mlindner wrote:
| I believe the CCS connector rule will eventually be changed.
| The momentum Tesla has with their own connector is simply too
| great.
|
| Keep in mind for European posters: this is not the European
| CCS. It's CCS type 1, which is quite a lot worse than CCS type
| 2 in Europe.
| hedora wrote:
| Tesla's market share is plummeting. They were at > 75% a year
| or so ago. Market consensus has them at 11% by end of 2024.
|
| Also, dongles to plug Teslas into CCS exist, and come with
| new Teslas, so there is no reason to build any more Tesla-
| only charging station wires.
| mlindner wrote:
| Tesla vehicle production continues to grow at a very high
| rate however. Being over 75% of a market is ridiculous.
| That's kind of expected. Tesla has said many times they're
| not competing with EV companies, they're competing with all
| vehicle production.
|
| Also are you measuring vehicle sales or vehicle ownership?
| Anything over 50% production and Tesla vehicle ownership
| percentage continues to grow versus any other vehicle, EV
| or otherwise.
|
| > Market consensus has them at 11% by end of 2024.
|
| I laughed when I saw that number. Who is claiming that?
| Because that's certainly not consensus.
|
| I can only find things from mid-2022 and that predates
| Tesla's price drop.
| jp191919 wrote:
| >Also, dongles to plug Teslas into CCS exist, and come with
| new Teslas
|
| These adapters do not come with new Teslas.
| brianwawok wrote:
| My tesla built in 2020 has "CCS" support chip. So yes, I
| need a physical plug thing - but my car has the internals
| to support it. This is not true for all Teslas, but it
| generally true for new ones.
| vel0city wrote:
| Kind of. New Teslas still need to buy a ~$200~ $250
| physical CCS to Tesla adapter. They have the circuitry to
| work with CCS stalls, but don't have the right pinout.
|
| https://shop.tesla.com/product/ccs-combo-1-adapter
| vel0city wrote:
| This will only change if Tesla changes their licensing on the
| connector.
| darkwater wrote:
| wow! I hope Europe does something like this like... now,
| especially the enforced credit card contactless payment option.
| It just sucks so hard right now that it's my biggesest
| complaint against EVs right now.
| gruturo wrote:
| Seconding this.
|
| Recently took a few long-ish trips in the EU, non-Tesla
| chargers are utter garbage. None of them just accept a
| credit/debit (EC) card, there are 20 different networks and
| you need to create an account with each of them, assuming of
| course their signup system isn't down today, or just the
| entire network. Having to randomly re-log because they kick
| you out of the app when they encounter any unexpected server
| reply or timeout, etc.
|
| And this is just the app+payment garbage. The charger
| themselves.... 30% of them don't work, 10% don't exist at
| all, 10% are inaccessible (inside a private garage, inside
| private premises, etc), the rest are understandably crowded
| and you end up waiting a lot. The Aldi and Lidl (supermarket
| chains) chargers are actually the least bad, and once they
| stopped being free the crazy overcrowding also stopped. I
| just avoid all others at this point.
| darkwater wrote:
| Just 20 networks? :D And then you have the apps that let
| you use more networks at once that overcharge you an
| abusive surplus (Bonnet being the only exception I'm aware
| of)
| kposehn wrote:
| Speaking as a non-tesla EV owner I've not been that unhappy with
| Electrify America. After several road trips and >16,000mi I've
| only had a few negative experiences.
|
| That said, I'm an outlier - plenty of others have had many issues
| and it needs fixing. Tesla opening Superchargers is a good step,
| but EA and other networks need some serious pressure to improve,
| _now_.
| zzzeek wrote:
| > Mr. Musk has criticized the new law, and said that federal
| funding for electric-vehicle charging is unnecessary.
|
| and yet this law is going to incentivize you to actually open up
| your chargers so that I can charge my Hyundai there. Works for me
| asynchronous wrote:
| [flagged]
| Geeek wrote:
| Lol in what way is Hyundai a inferior manufacturer? Their EVs
| keep on getting top of the line rankings
| zzzeek wrote:
| well you're going to see mine so I guess deal with it?
| bragr wrote:
| Huh? Hyundai has the fastest charging vehicles on the market
| thanks to the much higher battery pack voltage. Tesla's
| battery is starting to look behind the times.
| NickM wrote:
| Hyundai is definitely doing well in terms of charging
| speed, but they're still a bit slower than Tesla (220 kW vs
| 250 kW). The marketing is confusing here, as Hyundai cars
| need a "350 kW charger" to achieve their max charging
| speed, and so they like to mention that 350 kW number, but
| they don't actually have the ability to draw anywhere near
| 350 kW of electricity.
| bragr wrote:
| You need to look at the charging curve vs the peak
| charging rate. Teslas quickly derate from their peak
| rate.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| > Tesla offered wayyyy back to make their charging system the
| industry standard
|
| You neglected to mention the conditions. Tesla did not make
| any kind of serious offer, and as a result no manufacturers
| took them up on it, because it would have been a terrible
| business decision.
| dmitriid wrote:
| > No, I don't wanna see a Hyundai next to me at a
| supercharger station.
|
| Ma, look, a segregationist.
| blitzar wrote:
| > Mr. Musk has criticized the new law, and said that federal
| funding for electric-vehicle charging is unnecessary.
|
| He is free to repay all the government subsidies and funding he
| has received if they are unwanted.
| NickM wrote:
| Not to nitpick, but the law doesn't _compel_ Tesla to open up
| their charging network. However, they need to open the network
| if they want access to the additional federal funding. Which,
| clearly they felt was a worthwhile trade.
| zzzeek wrote:
| compel is the wrong word, i was trying not to use "force".
| guess "motivate" is all that's left
| revscat wrote:
| Perhaps "incentivize" would be more accurate.
| zzzeek wrote:
| ooh that's it, why are online thesauruses so bad
| reaperducer wrote:
| "My thesaurus is terrible. It's also terrible."
|
| -- Siri's response when I asked her "Tell me a joke" last
| night.
| TOMDM wrote:
| It feels like all I talk about these days, but ChatGPT is
| the best thesaurus I've ever used.
| noslenwerdna wrote:
| Superchargers are convenient because Teslas are fast charging.
| When these slower charging cars get access, it'll be more
| convenient for the owners of other types of cars at the cost of
| Tesla owners waiting in long lines to charge.
| bink wrote:
| Teslas aren't the fastest charging EVs anymore and haven't
| been for some time. Yes, there will be Leafs and Bolts and
| other slow charging cars, but there will be faster charging
| cars as well as long as Tesla's newer chargers support a
| faster standard.
| revscat wrote:
| One of Tesla's biggest market advantages is the quality and
| ubiquity of their charging network. There's no other charging
| network that you can just drive up to, be 95% certain that it's
| going to work, plug in, and start charging without having to
| download an app. Blink at least allows for contactless payments
| now, but their chargers are still all slow chargers, I believe.
|
| It's no surprise that he is resistant.
|
| It needs to happen, though. Like you I'm glad and incentives
| are being provided.
| kjksf wrote:
| > It's no surprise that he is resistant.
|
| For many years now Tesla offered other car makers to use
| Tesla's superchargers as long as they chip in some of the
| cost of building it.
|
| It was a fair offer that no car maker took.
|
| The Fed offers a fair deal: free money under the condition of
| chargers being open to all.
|
| Tesla was always willing to open supercharging to others
| under fair terms so it's incorrect to label Musk as
| "resistant" to this. If he was "resistant", Tesla wouldn't
| take the deal.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| Is this referring to Tesla's "patent pledge" or some other
| offer?
|
| Because the patent pledge was a bit of a joke. It amounted
| to "You can use Tesla's patents, as long as you agree not
| to assert any patent or other IP against any company for
| making EVs or related equipment."
|
| So you don't just have to let Tesla use your patents in
| exchange for you using theirs, you have to give them away
| to every competitor, whether or not those competitors are
| sharing their own patents. It's not surprising that no one
| has taken them up on this.
| farisjarrah wrote:
| If you squint, that almost sounds like an AGPL license
| but for physical chargers.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| If using one piece of AGPL software forced your company
| to release every other piece of software as AGPL too, and
| then people spent the next 10 years acting surprised that
| nobody else was willing to touch Tesla's software with a
| ten foot pole
| zzzeek wrote:
| im fairly certain I'll have to download an app to use a tesla
| charger with my car. tesla cars already have "the app" inside
| them because the car / charger / billing is all integrated
| and owned by a single company. I'd rather not buy into a
| monolithic arrangement like that.
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| Other car manufacturers could easily put the necessary apps
| in their entertainment systems.
| mwint wrote:
| Other manufacturers can barely make a working play button
| for music on my phone, I'm not very optimistic about two
| way billing communication through a charge port.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| If you have to download an app, it looks like Tesla won't
| get the incentive money:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34805587
| vel0city wrote:
| Having an app == contactless payment according to the
| document.
| revscat wrote:
| Well, yes, but that's going to be true regardless of the
| network. I meant after the initial download and account set
| up. I should've been more clear. Tesla is the only network
| I have used where I can just drive up, plug in, and start
| charging. I hope this is where everyone eventually goes.
| vel0city wrote:
| I don't own a Tesla and have had many experiences of
| drive up, plug in, and start charging.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_15118
| kjksf wrote:
| What do you own and where are those magic EV chargers
| that don't require you to do SOMETHING other than
| plugging in, like swiping a credit card or some such?
| vel0city wrote:
| I own a Ford Mustang Mach E. I've had plug and charge
| work successfully every time I've used an Electrify
| America station. I've also had it work at EVGo and
| Chargepoint locations.
| mlindner wrote:
| Well yes it makes sense to criticize the government effectively
| subsidizing your competitors when they failed to innovate. This
| reduces the willingness of companies to innovate like Tesla did
| because they know they can sit on the haunches and wait for the
| government to bail them out with tax payer's money.
| zzzeek wrote:
| other car manufacturers aren't actually building charging
| stations. they rightfully see this as a separate endeavor.
| Tesla's hard-binding of their cars with their chargers is
| simply anticompetitive. I would like the government to help
| correct this.
| mwint wrote:
| Who the heck was going to build chargers in 2011-2016 if
| not Tesla? They had to do it for their product to be
| usable. It's not like they tried to corner the market,
| there just wasn't a market at all.
| kjksf wrote:
| You both absolved car makers of their strategic
| incompetence and stretched the idea of "anti-competitive"
| beyond breaking point.
|
| I get why car makers don't want to do charging - it takes
| capital, it takes away focus and historically it's not what
| they do.
|
| But customers do not car what's easy of convenient for the
| business.
|
| Tesla saw the chicken and egg problem and solved. It was
| risky (especially for a company that, at the time, was
| loosing money) and costly but they saw the obvious truth:
| without wide spread, convenient network of chargers people
| will not buy EV cars.
|
| They also publicly declared that if any other car makers
| wants access, all they have to do is to chip in some of the
| cost.
|
| That was more than fair and consistent with their goal of
| accelerating transition to sustainable energy. They were
| not hoarding the superchargers, just looking for a fair
| deal.
|
| No car maker took them up on the offer, despite that being
| the right thing to do for their customers and to grow EV
| market overall.
|
| I don't see why competitors should now benefit from the
| hard work and billions of dollars that Tesla invested into
| their supercharger network.
|
| The feds are giving companies free money so it's fair that
| they require open access and it's the deal Tesla always
| thought would be fair, which is why they took it.
| vel0city wrote:
| > They also publicly declared that if any other car
| makers wants access, all they have to do is to chip in
| some of the cost.
|
| No, Tesla continues their patent licensing deal. If you
| agree to never sue Tesla or any other company which uses
| Tesla's IP for infringing on your IP, they'll agree to
| never sue you for using their IP.
|
| So say GM wants to use the Tesla connector on the Bolt.
| They have to agree to let Tesla use _all_ of their IP.
| But not only that, they have to also agree to not sue
| _any other company_ that also uses Tesla 's IP if they
| infringe on GM's IP.
|
| So say Ford also uses the Tesla connector, and then
| copies many of GM's designs. GM cannot enforce any of
| their IP against Ford without being in violation of
| Tesla's licensing deal, which opens them up to getting
| sued by Tesla for having the Tesla connector.
|
| This isn't just the car makers though, this is anyone
| wanting to use Tesla's IP. So say Delta (a manufacturer
| of EV charging equipment) wants to offer Tesla connectors
| on their DC fast chargers. They have to follow the same
| thing, and allow Tesla to then copy any of their IP. But
| not just Tesla, they have to let Sema also copy any of
| their IP if Sema also starts to use Tesla connectors.
|
| Tesla's licensing deal was a Trojan horse trying to
| nullify intellectual property rights in the automotive
| industry, and pretty much none of the bigger players
| wanted to give up all their IP.
| danans wrote:
| > You both absolved car makers of their strategic
| incompetence and stretched the idea of "anti-competitive"
| beyond breaking point.
|
| Both can simultaneously be true. The carmakers have sat
| on their hands, and Tesla is arguably anti-competitive
| with it's charging network.
| mlindner wrote:
| The CCS standard didn't exist when Tesla created their own
| charging connector, and there were many other connectors at
| the time. CCS is objectively worse than Tesla's standard in
| both form factor and ease of use.
|
| What the government is doing is anti-competitive, not
| Tesla.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| If I've learned one thing in my life, it's that the
| friction caused by competing "standards" is always 1000%
| worse than any hypothetical pain you'll suffer from
| choosing the weaker one.
| mlindner wrote:
| In this case it's the government mandating the weaker
| one, through the lobbying of competitors trying to wreck
| the market leader. It's the _way_ that this happened that
| puts such a sour taste in my mouth personally.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| Tesla had several years to open-source the NACS standard
| if they wanted to: that is, _really_ open source it
| without attaching patent grant conditions. Instead they
| waited to do so until the very late date of November 2022
| [1], which is many years after both Europe and the US
| settled on CCS1 /2.
|
| The CCS standardization has been ongoing for over a
| decade. Even so: if Tesla had fully opened NACS even as
| late as _five years ago_ there 's some chance it could
| have become the dominant standard in North America. Tesla
| waiting until late 2022 to submit NACS as a standard
| isn't consistent with being "wrecked by competitors":
| it's more like a harmful troll. Now NACS is either going
| to be another dead legacy standard or (worse) North
| America will end up with two incompatible zombie
| standards for a long time, and many people (including
| Tesla owners like myself) will have to use annoying and
| unsafe adapters.
|
| [1] https://www.tesla.com/blog/opening-north-american-
| charging-s...
| mlindner wrote:
| Tesla submitted their charging standard as the standard
| for CCS. It was refused.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| Tesla doesn't have to take the offer though. They are doing
| it voluntarily, then complaining about it.
| mlindner wrote:
| Just because you're compiling with something doesn't mean
| you like to comply with it... I'm not sure what argument
| you're trying to make. The alternative is competitors being
| subsidized.
| mwint wrote:
| Tesla knows that if they don't take it voluntarily, the
| govt (well, big auto lobbyists) will switch from carrot to
| stick. That's just how it works when someone writes a law
| and you know they have you in mind specifically.
| christkv wrote:
| The charging infrastructure they are building will become a big
| earner in the long run I think. It's building and owning the gas
| stations.
| jedberg wrote:
| This isn't the first time they are doing it. It's already
| happening in test markets in Europe, and in fact there are three
| Tesla chargers available today in the Bay Area for non-tesla
| cars. But they are all in private parking lots.
|
| I can't wait till the open up, because right now when we go to
| our local target, there are four non-tesla chargers, always full
| (sometimes with Teslas!) and 20-30 Tesla chargers that are mostly
| empty.
| JoshTko wrote:
| It's a trap
| shever73 wrote:
| https://archive.ph/Htc1m
|
| This is already happening in the UK and Europe. Using the Tesla
| app, you can see which superchargers are now public.
| outlace wrote:
| Seems like many superchargers are already overcrowded with Teslas
| alone in my experience, so this will reduce the appeal of Teslas.
| The biggest advantage Tesla has and the main reason I chose it is
| due to its dedicated charging infrastructure which is way better
| than other systems.
| poxrud wrote:
| Agreed. I would love to switch to another electric car but the
| lack of a public country wide charging network (in Canada)
| leaves me with no alternatives.
| rtkwe wrote:
| You still get the way better integration between chargers and
| car. One of the big benefits I've seen on in the "we took a
| road trip in these N different electric cars" genre of videos
| is that Tesla's navigation knows how many cars are there and
| the status of the chargers where other cars can get nearly
| stranded if you try to stretch to reach a charging point only
| to find it's broken with no indication it wouldn't work before
| you get there.
| noodle wrote:
| I agree with this point, though at least in theory this is a
| path for them to get more $ and therefore expand the network
| further/faster, also potentially increasing the size of the
| moat. We'll see if they actually do that, though, I guess.
| neonate wrote:
| https://archive.ph/Htc1m
| cowmix wrote:
| As a Model Y owner I just rented a Polestar to do a 72 hrs, 800
| mile trip -- just to evaluate the experience. I missed my Y for
| many reasons however the trip went well overall but the Electrify
| America charging infrastructure leaves much to be desired.
| HOWEVER, their rate pre kwh can be 30% cheaper at peak times so I
| just bought the CCS adapter so I can optionally use those
| chargers -- even when cross country driving in my Tesla.
| robterrell wrote:
| What company rents Polestars?
| t3rabytes wrote:
| Hertz
| haliskerbas wrote:
| How many times did you stop to charge? I avoided renting an EV
| because I didn't want a 30m+ stop during an otherwise
| uninterrupted road trip.
| sliken wrote:
| My longest trip in my Tesla was just west of Sacramento to
| just past Denver, 1150 miles. The car charges at between 600
| and 1000 miles per hour when it's nearly empty.
|
| Our stops were in the 15 minute range, often as the last
| person returned after a snack or bathroom break we had enough
| to drive enough 50-75% of range (180 to 270 miles). Not bad
| for driving since the stops were every 3 to 4.5 hours.
|
| Charging often is most time efficient to charge fairly often
| since charging is much faster when the battery is in the
| bottom 50% than the top 50%.
|
| Keep in mind charging is much nicer than filling. No pulling
| out a credit card, no typing in your zip code, no skipping
| the car wash, no selecting a fuel type, no "delays" while
| watching a _loud_ ad, no trying to find the mute button, no
| getting sprayed with stinky gas tinged air (not all states
| reclaim the vapor), no hitting a mute button again because it
| timed out, etc.
|
| Just grab charger, hit button to open the charge port, and
| plug in.
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| > (not all states reclaim the vapor)
|
| What?! That's just so primitive it's hard to understand.
| sliken wrote:
| I first noticed it in Nevada, dramatically thinner
| nozzle. At first I thought I was using some diesel or
| something else not compatible. Then the smell hit as the
| gas started flowing.
|
| I have noticed that driving an EV makes you much more
| aware of the smell of gas cars. Even in traffic I notice
| smelly cars much more often.
| thexumaker wrote:
| thank god, the charging network outside of tesla's supercharger
| network is terrible. But last time I went on a roadtrip on a
| popular route up and down i-5 there weren't enough chargers. I
| can't imagine these supercharger networks getting any better
| unless they build 100 mile lots for charging
| nkotov wrote:
| I wish more chargers would follow similar model to charging to
| how Superchargers work - high amperage, plug-and-go. I used a
| non-Tesla charger for my Model Y yesterday at a parking garage.
| Let me tell you the experience:
|
| 1. Came up, no directions on what app I should use to pay for
| charging, a couple feet away found that I should download
| PlugShare. Downloaded PlugShare, setup my info, allows for Apple
| Pay, nice. Says it needs to do a $30 pre-auth in order to get
| started. Fine.
|
| 2. Plugged my car in, I barely get 30A from the plug, whatever.
| Leave it plugged in for 4 hours. Come back, unplug. No way to
| stop the charging or my session in the app. I just leave it there
| thinking perhaps it'll reset session. A couple minutes later,
| someone else starts using my session...
|
| 3. 9 hours later, I get a notification that charging has finally
| stopped and I was charged for the amount. :(
| slenk wrote:
| I don't think most electrical grids can spare that much high
| amperage all the time. You know they aren't getting priority on
| the grid.
| sliken wrote:
| Keep in mind that, at least currently, most EVs charge at
| home, off hours, when there's a surplus. It's not much power,
| on average it's less than a single 120v socket.
|
| Sadly only Tesla knows the totals, but I'd be surprised if
| supercharging is (on average) 1/20th of the home charging.
|
| Around 1/3rd of the Tesla owners I know have solar panels,
| although many of those are in California and they changed the
| rates to be 1/4th or less of what they were, so they no
| longer contribute to the grid, but instead time shift with
| batteries.
|
| The power production folks are lobbying for lower rates,
| which lowers the amount of solar that enters the grid, which
| increases demand for electricity, which makes more profit for
| the power companies. Sad.
| nkotov wrote:
| If we can't spare that much amperage, why force everyone into
| EVs?
| slenk wrote:
| Personally I don't think we should. Sorry if I implied
| that.
|
| As long as coal is powering the electricity in the cars,
| what exactly is helping the environment?
| saturn_vk wrote:
| Even if your entire grid was running on coal, it's much
| easier to reduce the emissions of a power plant, than to
| all the ice cars
| vel0city wrote:
| About 30% of the energy that goes to power my car comes
| from renewable sources such as wind and solar. Another
| 10% comes from nuclear. A little over 40% comes from
| mostly combined cycle natural gas plants. Slightly less
| than 20% comes from coal.
|
| On top of that, because of the efficiency of my car and
| the plants running, I get the equivalent energy usage of
| about 100MPG for an ICE.
|
| The break even emissions on my car including
| manufacturing given this kind of mix is within a few
| years. If I drive the car for 5+ years (most likely),
| it'll be way lower emissions than my ICE driving for 5+
| years. Meanwhile in the next 5+ years, chances are the
| mix of renewables will increase. Maybe even nuclear.
| Chances are the coal plants will close soon though.
| slenk wrote:
| So...couple things.
|
| 1) I am jealous you live somewhere where nuclear is an
| option. In most states in the US, nuclear power is
| decreasing.
|
| 2) Natural gas isn't any better than coal.
|
| 3) Coal won't go away as long as conservatives are in
| power in the house - they love coal.
|
| 4) I think ICE vs Electric greatly depends on how much
| you use your car. I drive maybe once or twice a week,
| only city - I am going to be constantly having to charge
| my car since the battery will go dead if you leave it
| unplugged in cold weather (Michigan). A tank of gas lasts
| me for like 3 months. There is no way EV would be better
| for the environment.
| jeromegv wrote:
| > 3) Coal won't go away as long as conservatives are in
| power in the house - they love coal.
|
| Doesn't matter what politicians think. As long as they
| don't start giving coal away or pure subsidies for it, if
| coal keeps being more expensive than natural gas, its
| share will keep going down. The force of the market
| decides.
| slenk wrote:
| And the more natural gas, the more methane that is leaked
| into the atmosphere, which is a much stronger greenhouse
| gas than carbon dioxide.
| vel0city wrote:
| Coal will continue to decline if its unprofitable to run
| the coal plants, which it often is. If open to market
| forces, which in my state it probably is _too_ open to
| market forces but that 's another story, things like coal
| will die out compared to renewables and natural gas.
|
| And, yes, natural gas while it has its issues is still
| better than coal. Even with the leakages, which
| theoretically could be fixed. Coal causes a bigger
| nuclear issue than nuclear power plants. There's so many
| ways in which natural gas is better than coal, but I do
| agree natural gas still has climate change impacts and is
| ultimately non-renewable and not sustainable for much
| longer timescales.
|
| As for your car, you may not drive it many miles. But
| you're going to sell it eventually I'd imagine. And then
| that person is going to probably drive an average usage
| on it. So that car is probably still going to end up
| hitting its break even point unless you only end up
| driving it 10,000mi and then crush it after you're done
| with it.
| dilap wrote:
| I think you could make an argument that it's still worth
| it just to get car emissions out of dense urban
| environments.
|
| Even in San Francisco, which has pretty clean air (being
| right by the bay), it was really remarkable during the
| early, lock-down part of the pandemic how much nicer the
| air was without the car emissions. Especially noticable
| when biking.
| slenk wrote:
| I'll admit I didn't take that into account. This assumes
| the power plants won't cause pollutants in dense urban
| areas though
| belltaco wrote:
| The share of Coal is plummeting.
|
| https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/images/2021.07.28/main.
| svg
|
| The electric car you buy today will steadily get greener
| over it's lifetime. The gas car will not.
| slenk wrote:
| Natural gas is NO better than coal. Don't let the current
| media blitz fool you
| jeromegv wrote:
| Any source for that? Quick google search seems to imply
| otherwise
|
| https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/natural-gas/natural-
| gas-...
| slenk wrote:
| https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-gas-climatebox-
| explai...
|
| https://group.met.com/en/mind-the-
| fyouture/mindthefyouture/n...
|
| https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/super-
| pot...
|
| Methane is bad. Even is mentioned in your link.
| Analemma_ wrote:
| Because that's not true everywhere. Washington state, for
| example, is 85% hydro, 5% wind, 5% nuclear - and much of
| that is wasted at night since rivers don't turn off.
| Switching everyone here to EVs would be a massive win.
| slenk wrote:
| Think about the Texas electrical grid. Do you think ERCOT
| could handle a massive influx of EVs when an ice storm
| disrupts half the state?
| vel0city wrote:
| During that 2021 ice storm most gas pumps didn't work
| either.
|
| As for the recent ice storm, my EV had no problems
| charging here in Texas.
| slenk wrote:
| But if EVERY person had an EV it would have had problems.
|
| And what if you were one of the unfortunate people who
| lost power for 5 days and had an EV? If it wasn't charged
| enough to go to a charging station that might have
| power...what do you do?
|
| I am honestly curious: how in the world did gas pumps
| freeze? Are gas pumps actually built differently in the
| north?
| vel0city wrote:
| > I am honestly curious: how in the world did gas pumps
| freeze? Are gas pumps actually built differently in the
| north?
|
| Pumps need power to, you know, pump. They don't just
| magically dispense gas and handle payments. Most gas
| stations around me could not operate and were closed as
| they did not have electricity to operate.
|
| > And what if you were one of the unfortunate people who
| lost power for 5 days and had an EV? If it wasn't charged
| enough to go to a charging station that might have
| power...what do you do?
|
| Lots of people didn't have gas in their cars, or they ran
| out, and, well, the gas pumps didn't have power, so they
| couldn't pump the gas, so their cars were dead. If they
| didn't have enough gas to drive far enough to a station
| that _did_ have power, wouldn 't they be in the same
| situation as that EV owner?
|
| In the end my experience in that winter storm would have
| been the same if I had a gas car or an electric. I'd only
| have the range I had when the lights went out. I don't
| store a lot of gas at home, not any amount that would
| make an appreciable difference in range.
|
| Pointing to things like that winter storm as some example
| of day to day life is extreme. It was a pretty big
| outlier, one that I agree Texas (and the rest of the US,
| see NY 2022) needs to be ready to happen more often. But
| acting like that's just normal day to day life is a bit
| absurd. What if the city gets flooded every day from
| massive hurricanes like with Katrina? EVs sure wouldn't
| be great then! What of the town has massive tornadoes
| ripping through like Joplin? EVs sure wouldn't be helpful
| in that environment!
|
| If over the next 5 years every single family home in
| Texas swapped an ICE for an EV, the "grid" would probably
| absorb it without much issue. There's already so much
| spare capacity prices go negative most evenings.
| slenk wrote:
| Holy crap the electricity for pumps didn't click with me.
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