DCFC in America - it’s falling apart

[daverp]

Anyone who argues that free charging is a good thing probably doesn't commute in their MME. When you do and you're waiting for hours at a station because some greedy, selfish local is charging their car for free, your opinions may change. There's no need to give someone something for free so that they can try it out, when they need juice they'll get it to work, free or not. All these handouts need to stop.

The problem is thinking of them as handouts and thinking your preferred charger would have existed without this "free" charging. From a business perspective, EA Q1 2023 earnings call, contracted revenue is 50% of their income, that's the "free" charging, because the manufactures are paying a lot for this. It's not free, it's a value add to the car the manufacture is selling. it's the single biggest asset they have funding their network. Also being contracted it's great for securing the financing they use to build the network. When you ask to end the handout of free charging you're asking to cut the companies revenue by 1/2 which translates it to massive investment cuts, that would basicley end all new chargers on the EA network. They would have to massively cut the existing network or pray that all these "free" people start paying more than what the manufactures were or they would quickly become insolvent.

There is always a flip side to a coin and it's often not better.

We do 95%+ of our charging at home. Not everyone can do that. You say it's a college town and that often means a high number of rental properties, condos, and apartments.

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[sotek2345]

Long EV trips sure don't seem worth the hassle. Road trips are why God made gasoline.

Not sure I agree. We find EV travel much more relaxing and enjoyable than ICE travel, not to mention much cheaper and less guilt filled (pollution). Until I get my Lightning (it's down to weeks now!), we still have an ICE vehicle, but still prefer to take the Mach-e whenever feasible.

 

[Logal727]

The problem with free charging, as I've said many times before, is that locals end up at DCFC stations to charge because, well, it's free! Go figure right?

So, anyone who actually needs those chargers, the few that are actually operational, can't get to them because someone is there sucking down free juice instead of paying for it at home. I've even seen physical fights break out over these stations by locals.

Anyone who argues that free charging is a good thing probably doesn't commute in their MME. When you do and you're waiting for hours at a station because some greedy, selfish local is charging their car for free, your opinions may change. There's no need to give someone something for free so that they can try it out, when they need juice they'll get it to work, free or not. All these handouts need to stop.

I would equate the free 250kwh with the free tank of gas you get from a dealership most of the time in an ICE vehicle. But anything other than that isn't needed. (I guess technically dealerships are supposed to charge the car, so maybe that's the same?). If someone were to depend on that 250kw as their sole charging, it wouldn't go very far.

 

[Logal727]

Not sure I agree. We find EV travel much more relaxing and enjoyable than ICE travel, not to mention much cheaper and less guilt filled (pollution). Until I get my Lightning (it's down to weeks now!), we still have an ICE vehicle, but still prefer to take the Mach-e whenever feasible.

Same here, I actually enjoy taking road trips now cause I get to drive my car long distances, and it's always amazing that I'm being propelled across the country by electrons, and that's really cool. It also helps us take scheduled breaks, not much different than doing roadtrips in an ICE vehicle, just a tiny bit more planning.

 

[DevSecOps]

The problem is thinking of them as handouts and thinking your preferred charger would have existed without this "free" charging. From a business perspective, EA Q1 2023 earnings call, contracted revenue is 50% of their income, that's the "free" charging, because the manufactures are paying a lot for this. It's not free, it's a value add to the car the manufacture is selling. it's the single biggest asset they have funding their network. Also being contracted it's great for securing the financing they use to build the network. When you ask to end the handout of free charging you're asking to cut the companies revenue by 1/2 which translates it to massive investment cuts, that would basicley end all new chargers on the EA network. They would have to massively cut the existing network or pray that all these "free" people start paying more than what the manufactures were or they would quickly become insolvent.

There is always a flip side to a coin and it's often not better.

We do 95%+ of our charging at home. Not everyone can do that. You say it's a college town and that often means a high number of rental properties, condos, and apartments.

Every hand out that we give is paid for by someone. I'm not naive enough to believe that it's money falling from the sky. My point is that free charging is a massive problem. I say this as someone who needs to use DCFC weekly for commuting.

Instead of giving it away, double the rates and make it profit generating for the locations that install chargers. If you make something profitable people will franchise and install them without much effort.

 

[Logal727]

The sample and free charging in reality was for when DCFC would typically be used and that is road tripping which for a lot of people stepping into the world of EVs from ICE was going to be one of those things people would have concerns so but offering some amount of free charging it was a way for manufactures to seal the deal.

I have no problems with them doing that the problem for me is that the current location of most DCFC chargers are in the worst place possible, place them along interstates at useful distances in-between towns and you pretty much guarantee that it will just be people traveling that are using them.

Instead we have a large number in placed in walmart / shopping mall car parks, so anybody traveling is fighting to use them with all the locals that will be foolish not to take advantage of the free charging while going shopping. Even if you removed the free charging I doubt things would get much better as you only have look at the state of a costco / sams club gas station packed with cars all overflowing into the car park as everybody decides to fill up when doing the weekly shop.

Rows of L2 destination chargers are far better suited for car parks where locals and people staying in town visiting can top up if needed not a token number of DCFC and until more DCFC appears in useful locations then things will get worse before they get better.

Yeah, lack of L2 in Savannah is why I ended up charging twice on the way there from Florida, just so I could be topped off around town. In the end, I found their parking garages (which were paid) had pretty decent L2 setups with Tesla destination and Clipper creek chargers for J1772, so it wasn't needed. But the unpredictability around it is what made me nervous.

 

[Logal727]

Every hand out that we give is paid for by someone. I'm not naive enough to believe that it's money falling from the sky. My point is that free charging is a massive problem. I say this as someone who needs to use DCFC weekly for commuting.

Instead of giving it away, double the rates and make it profit generating for the locations that install chargers. If you make something profitable people will franchise and install them without much effort.

Yeah, I mean Tesla is already charging 56 cents a kWh at their chargers, which is kind of crazy if you use it all the time, but I couldn't imagine they aren't making profits on that.

 

[daverp]

The only good answer to this problem is chargers, there just needs to be more chargers. DCFC is not the answer it's just one piece of the puzzle, people need in home chargers, apartment and condo associations need to install chargers, more destination chargers. Charging connector needs to be universal. All current generation Superchargers are CCS, they just use a different connector. There is no magic sauce to a Tesla Destination charger, just a proprietary plug.

Despite what YouTubers and marketing people will try to tell people, Solar car roofs and regen breaking improvements are not going to solve the issue in the long term. You eventual run into science on those. You can't create or destroy energy, just transfer it. Even at 100% efficiency it's never going to amount to a ton of gain. On regen we are near peak already, gains in that area are minimal now. Solar roofs on cars is a gimmick. Hyundai didn't even bring theirs to the US as in the real world it basicley offset it's range loss from carrying it. The Fisker ones is to be seen but based on the rough numbers they given, if you can park your car on the equator at 5% soc, on the first day of summer, you might hit 80% soc in about 2 months, if you get lucky on the weather.

Ultra long range (600+ miles) is probably never going to be main stream, at least in our lifetimes. Cars are build for the masses not an individual. It's a very small market that has the need, want, and capital for the vehicles in that class. Issue one is you're taking a efficiency hit on the bulk of your driving to have that range when you needed do to the extra weight. Issue two charge times would be long, which will make the charger situation even worse, as again most people couldn't afford this car so they'll still be at the charger. Third issue is tires. EV's are heavy and already eat up tires quicker, now you're talking about adding a significant amount of weight. Forth is space. Mache-E and F150 Lighting in their extended range versions have the skateboard fully packed with batteries. You need either major advancements with battery tech, or you're giving up useable space in the car to fit in more batteries.


There are working concepts for inductive charging parking lots and swappable battery cartages that look cool, but I again don't think those will be mainstream in our lifetimes.

 

[Shelbeast]

I don't believe that is accurate, but if you have a source, please share.

I travel to NC frequently, and have a house in the Outer Banks. It is a very nice state. Not trash at all.

North Carolina Bill Would Mandate Removal of Free EV Chargers (caranddriver.com)

 

[daverp]

Yeah, I mean Tesla is already charging 56 cents a kWh at their chargers, which is kind of crazy if you use it all the time, but I couldn't imagine they aren't making profits on that.

Head to head, in most cases Superchargers are cheaper than EVgo and EA. That $.56 number that was in the news was the increased peak rate for California. Like all other charging networks Supercharger rates vary depending on location and local laws. and Tesla price theirs higher for faster rates.

It's been about a year since I used a Supercharger but in Texas it was $.21 cents per kWH..

 

[Logal727]

Head to head, in most cases Superchargers are cheaper than EVgo and EA. That $.56 number that was in the news was the increased peak rate for California. Like all other charging networks Supercharger rates vary depending on location and local laws. and Tesla price theirs higher for faster rates.

It's been about a year since I used a Supercharger but in Texas it was $.21 cents per kWH..

@voxel just sent a screen grab from Florida, who has cheap power as well, and the 12-9pm rate was .52 cents per kwh.

 

[timbop]

My point is that free charging is a massive problem. I say this as someone who needs to use DCFC weekly for commuting.

Idle charging stations are not generating revenue, which decreases the odds that the station's owners are going to make a profit. Unprofitable DCFC means that there very likely will be a decline in expansion or even decrease in DCFC stations, which isn't good for anyone with an EV. As mentioned by others, SOMEBODY is paying for "giveaway" charging sessions, so those "free" sessions are in fact generating revenue - which in turn helps to make DCFC profitable. Profitable DCFC ensures further investment, and ultimately to a much larger footprint of DCFC stations which is in everyone's best interest. Furthermore, heavy use of today's stations exposes their weaknesses before more of them are deployed, allowing new and more reliable designs to be fielded to improve reliability over the long term.

BUT, your short term needs should trump everyone else's needs, right? Everyone else is greedy but you're entitled to have an available charger whenever and wherever you want one, correct?

If you need DCFC every week for your commute, then a BEV is probably not the right choice for you

 

[RickMachE]

What I find interesting are the people who claim that because they find X out of Y chargers broken, that means the system is "falling apart". Zero examples of analysis, over time, to show that. I gave my interpretation, based on my usage of 1/2 dozen locations in August/September 2021, and then again some of them in March 2022. That is that it's getting BETTER, not worse.

This thread is full of subjective opinions, not facts. I'm sure that EA, and Ford, have facts, and they're pushing as hard as they can to get things better. A guy making a YouTube video for profit is the last place I'm looking for facts.

 

[Logal727]

Idle charging stations are not generating revenue, which decreases the odds that the station's owners are going to make a profit. Unprofitable DCFC means that there very likely will be a decline in expansion or even decrease in DCFC stations, which isn't good for anyone with an EV. As mentioned by others, SOMEBODY is paying for "giveaway" charging sessions, so those "free" sessions are in fact generating revenue - which in turn helps to make DCFC profitable. Profitable DCFC ensures further investment, and ultimately to a much larger footprint of DCFC stations which is in everyone's best interest. Furthermore, heavy use of today's stations exposes their weaknesses before more of them are deployed, allowing new and more reliable designs to be fielded to improve reliability over the long term.

BUT, your short term needs should trump everyone else's needs, right? Everyone else is greedy but you're entitled to have an available charger whenever and wherever you want one, correct?

It's still not profitable even with manufacturer buy-ins though. Increased usage causes more maintenance, which seems like they are having trouble containing, thus eating into any sort of revenue they've gained. Maybe if it were just a discounted rate for a couple years that would have been a better option.

 

[kennethjk]

Every day a new BEV is sold, it gets worse. Especially when the stupid car companies are offering free EA charging. Because of that, people who travel are competing with locals who just want their free stuff.

Free is only good if there is too much supply. Maybe two years ago you could say some areas had too much supply of DCFC capacity. Not anymore.

And here they come, like locusts looking for free food.

Aren’t car company’s using free enterprise and marketing by offering some free electricity to get you to buy their product over someone else’s.

they are paying EVGO, EA or whomever. I would think this is the American way, big business operating to sell more of their product.

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