Charging Station Congestion

[HuntingPudel]

<SNIP>
Wait until EVs are blamed for poor road conditions because of the extra weight of the vehicles! Coming soon to a partisan media boob near you.

Huh, my 1969 Cadillac was quite a bit heavier than my MME. The media boobs will need to get their facts checked. ??

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[Stevey]

As one person posted, there isn't enough of a financial incentive to build out a charging infrastructure. From my understanding even EA's $0.43 / KW rate has an extremely low return on investment. That starts pushing Economy ICE car price for travel (80% of 91 kw = 72.8 KW) $30.58 for ~ 250mi. For a 30mpg that same 250 miles would cost at $4/gal $33.34. I think we should let networks charge enough to be profitable enough to encourage charging infrastructure expansion. The Government can also play a role by standardizing per KW billing and help rein in peak demand charges to a reasonable price. Those electric oligopolies (read non-competitive) are allowed to exist so we don't have power lines for every company that wants to start their own power company.

 

[KevinS]

Huh, my 1969 Cadillac was quite a bit heavier than my MME. The media boobs will need to get their facts checked. ??

When have facts ever stood in the way before with sensationalist anti-EV headlines?

 

[mkhuffman]

Warning: I am from (socialist) Europe
Maybe legislation : no building permits unless adequate charging facility ?
Write your local lawmaker!

No warning necessary. Aren't all Europeans socialists? ?

That said, I think the free market can solve the problem faster and more cost effectively than a government bureaucracy ever could, as long as that government bureaucracy gets out of the way and doesn't put up regulatory roadblocks. Unfortunately the government rarely actually gets out of the way...

 

[metalpro2021]

That said, I think the free market can solve the problem faster and more cost effectively than a government bureaucracy ever could

If you happen to be the target group/area where profit margins are sufficient to shareholders you might be right. For all others there will be no product offering. Energy-transition-infrastructure need to be democratized : for the poor and the rich that is. I am afraid capitalism does not have the best track record for this goal. For the record: I am not suggesting any -ISMS here...

 

[heisnuts]

It's the same if going from Portland to Spokane. And what's even worse is one of the very few charging stations is "under repair" with only 2 plugs working at the moment. That has convinced me to take our ICE when going to Spokane next month.

 

[Tell It Right]

No warning necessary. Aren't all Europeans socialists? ?

That said, I think the free market can solve the problem faster and more cost effectively than a government bureaucracy ever could, as long as that government bureaucracy gets out of the way and doesn't put up regulatory roadblocks. Unfortunately the government rarely actually gets out of the way...

Agree with the sentiment, which is similar to what I posted. But to be specific, I think free market will work with the question of should hotels set up chargers (where renters make the decision of which hotel they'll stay at).

Free market doesn't work with most infrastructure-specific decisions, like if there's enough power going onto the grid in areas that will need it most (i.e. tourist areas that are liable to have a lot of EV's being charged be they at hotels are restaurants), or if there's enough chargers in a spaced out stretch of highway between towns. Like it or not, that has to be managed by the state or city.

Hopefully places like Texas that pushed for solar and wind power learned from their mistakes. One mistake was practically forcing it onto the utilities (no new fossil fueled power stations or upgrading existing fossil fueled power stations to meet higher demand, only new green energy sources). The other mistake was in managing the existing natural gas pipes (most notably allowing them to "freeze up" by not keeping pressure on them when people were using them little,, or perhaps another solution would be to keep the gas moving by pulling it back to the source pump if people weren't using much).

My home solar system works really well -- liking it enough to want more and hopefully be 85% to 95% independent even with the power draw of an EV. But it'll work that well only because I think like an analytical nerd (software engineer) and I know almost exactly my current power use, near future power use, and long term power use, so I can have my solar supplier design an upgrade to meet a specific target -- not try to hit a constantly moving target like utility engineers have to do when trying to efficiently implement green energy without knowing how many people will move into an area, move out, switch to EV's, set up new electric welding shops, etc. I'm not saying I'm smarter than the engineers at the power companies. I'm just saying my simple scenario can have a simple solution, while there scenario can't even be effectively defined, much less designed for.

That's the power decentralized green energy has over centralized green energy. Someone spending the money to put solar onto their house is more liable to think ahead to what they're going to need in the foreseeable future. Centralized energy planners have no clue what kinds of decisions the masses will make in the future.

 

[mkhuffman]

Free market doesn't work with most infrastructure-specific decisions, like if there's enough power going onto the grid in areas that will need it most (i.e. tourist areas that are liable to have a lot of EV's being charged be they at hotels are restaurants), or if there's enough chargers in a spaced out stretch of highway between towns. Like it or not, that has to be managed by the state or city.

While it appears we have the same mindset, we can agree to disagree on this one. The problem with infrastructure is not that it is a free market. It is not. Infrastructure is heavily regulated by government.

So if my power company, Dominion Power, wants to upgrade their infrastructure, put some charging stations in, whatever, they cannot without government approval and without adhering to all the massive regulations imposed by local, state and federal bureaucrats. Power companies are seen as "monopolies" and are very heavily regulated. If they actually were free from regulation, then infrastructure issues would be solved to meet market demands. 100% guaranteed.

Of course the argument many have when someone who is a crazy libertarian like me says we should deregulate utilities, is that costs will increase and people will not be able to afford electricity. Or something like that.

In reality government regulations are driving up electricity costs anyway. If we have a electricity free market, which we absolutely don't have now, competition could emerge to keep the utility "monopolies" in check. But of course no serious competition emerges because while government is regulating utilities, they are effectively protecting them from competition. Utilities know that, and they are fine working within the parameters set by government. They make a lot of money doing it, and they lobby a lot of politicians to keep it that way.

A electricity free market would scare the crap out of Dominion Energy. They might actually have to work to keep their customers happy, and work to get new customers. Because of government, they don't have to do either. How nice for them.

That's the power decentralized green energy has over centralized green energy. Someone spending the money to put solar onto their house is more liable to think ahead to what they're going to need in the foreseeable future. Centralized energy planners have no clue what kinds of decisions the masses will make in the future.

1000% on this bandwagon. We need to get the power of electricity into the hands of individuals. This is what Dominion Energy fears. This is the competition that will keep them in check if they were really free. Does this mean Dominion Energy is not really a monopoly? IMO, yes.

 

[mkhuffman]

We need lawmakers to be highly involved and highly visible in this stuff, always.

Lawmakers are the stupidest people in our society. They get power by lying to voters. And you want to give them even more power. Flabbergasted in Virginia.

 

[Engelbert]

Lawmakers are the stupidest people in our society. They get power by lying to voters. And you want to give them even more power. Flabbergasted in Virginia.

You shouldn’t be. Though if I lived in Virginia right now, I’d be appalled too. People were disgruntled before, yet now it has somehow stumbled down even farther to become a complete clown show. Unfortunate.

PA isn’t much better btw, but we are at least preventing the worst of the regressive partisan backsliding. It was so much worse here 10 years ago, at both state and local levels. A lot has improved.

Back to the bigger picture: I have seen, firsthand, for a generation, both lawmakers/regulators and corporate boardrooms/middle management bootlickers in action. That includes the automotive industry specifically. Both groups are chock full of sociopaths, people-users, and liars at the top. And yes, often stupid people (though less often than you might think). But if not for the growing presence of the former group, you’d be utterly and increasingly at the mercy of the latter group, in the face of new technology developing quickly. And that would be a complete disaster.

We have tried that hands-off approach many times in history, letting someone roll out new tech to the public without equal measure of regulatory involvement. Often, the resulting disaster was the public safety version of the Texas electrical grid: greed ruled, people died, industry deliberately chose to learn the wrong lessons, it was all preventable, and finally government had to step in for lack of any better alternatives. The costs ultimately fell to the people as a burden worse than if there had been some new common sense rules in the first place. This theme repeats again and again in industry histories.

As noted earlier: the only thing worse than getting the lawmakers involved is not getting the lawmakers involved. Nobody really wanted this to be the only viable way forward, but we’ve learned the hard way that it is. As industry capability grows in new and novel directions, so must the rule book. Everybody hates a schoolmarm, yet if we’re being honest here, we need them. ?‍

At least lawmakers are voted on by the people as a whole. Not just the slice of the people who (usually) want their rate of return and damn the externalities. Both groups are deeply flawed, but only one is constantly negatively incentivized toward public safety by the drumbeat of unceasingly growing shareholder return demands, lower public visibility, and less direct public accountability. Which group should structurally get FINAL say in matters of public safety and access, including new tech? Leaders elected by and beholden to a process that includes all voters, or those elected by and directly accountable to relatively few?

History has already provided us with that answer.

(This was originally about chargers at hotels, wasn’t it? ? )

 

[RickMachE]

No, it was about charging station congestion. Too much political crap in it now.

 

[TheVirtualTim]

I hope EA sticks to their buildout plan. They should now be in Cycle 3 (https://www.electrifyamerica.com/our-plan/). It's fixing to get very busy for EA and Tesla.

There is a nearby "coming soon" location that was part of Cycle 2 ... not only is it not up and running ... they haven't even started.

Possibly they are running behind schedule due to the pandemic ... don't know.

 

[silverelan]

Once we have charging stations spaced closer together along freeway routes, it should ease congestion and charger anxiety (fear of not being able to charge because the station is down). That’s why I’m especially happy about Starbucks & Volvo opening stations between Seattle and Denver. We need more stations and greater redundancy.

Baker, CA seems like it has the potential to be the ultimate charging town with EA, EVgo, and Chargepoint.

 

[mkhuffman]

(This was originally about chargers at hotels, wasn’t it? ? )

I disagree with just about everything in your post. I want to respond, but this is definitely not a pollical forum so I won't.

Back to charger congestion, I am planning to drive around VA next week and will need to DCFC. It will not be peak travel season, so I am really interested to see how much it has changed since the last time I did a DCFC.

I am worried about the charging station in Staunton off I81, as that is a busy road and I bet that EA station gets full on busy days. But I think I will purposely stop there just to see for myself. I will need to stop at at least one and that one is at the right spot on my route. I should be at around 30% charge when I get there. Hopefully. Last time I was there (a couple months ago) there was only one other car charging, another MME, who appeared to be local.

 

[Engelbert]

Although my political stuff was in response to others', I am clearly the biggest offender when it comes to word count. So I'll lay off too. Thanks for setting the example. ?

If there's anything that can unify people, it's love for this incredible vehicle. We have wandered from Delaware to almost Canada in our (but let's be honest, my) MME. That's less than many, but far more than I ever thought I'd do in an EV in just 3 months of 2022. The whole family is in love with it.

I am not familiar with the Staunton charging station. But as my DC fast-charging road trip count grows in the MME, I have noted that the fraction of chargers out of service - or inversely, in service - at any given station is often the best indicator of how busy the place will be, better even than the number of working stations occupied 25 minutes before I arrive at that station. Exceptions abound: rush hour, holiday, middle of the night. But "busy" is a fraction, and the numerator is more forgiving as it changes much more quickly than the denominator. When the denominator does change due to a station coming back online, or more likely a station failing, it can change the whole game at that charger for days, week, months... assuming EA intends to truly fix it at all, which often seems questionable.

I have my own thoughts as to why that should work as well as it does. Maybe it's just the chargers I'm stopping at. In a rare display of brevity I will save those thoughts for some other post.

As the apps' self-reporting of station availability can be very "overoptimistic," we all have already seized on the value of driver reports, e.g. PlugShare, to better gauge the true state of a station. But it does beg the question: shouldn't we be reporting charger outages to their respective owners EVERY SINGLE TIME we encounter them at a busy station, no exceptions, instead of doing what we sometimes do: just waiting to move 2 meters over to the next charger, maybe telling the other people at that station about it, and/or low key grousing on PlugShare?

I'm as guilty as anyone here, I suspect...

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