The truth about Electrify America's progress and Traveling with the Mach E

[zhackwyatt]

At first I was going to say "Why does a charging company need a proposal from a local entity in order to open a station?". But then I looked at that further and it appears to simply be a count of "submissions", which sounds like it could be as simple as a comment posted from an individual on their website (prior to Oct-2018). Not exactly a thorough way to plan a national network, although I trust it was only one small piece of the data used to help identify which corridors to prioritize early.

Anyone can suggest a site. I did for Kingman, AZ. Gotta get to Las Vegas somehow. I don't know how seriously they take it though.

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[dbsb3233]

Anyone can suggest a site. I did for Kingman, AZ. Gotta get to Las Vegas somehow. I don't know how seriously they take it though.

Yeah, I suspect it's more of a "satisfy public input" checkbox than anything. Given that the company started up as a product of the punishment phase of legal action from the government, I can see how they'd want to dot every "i" and cross every "t".

Not that wishlist suggestions have zero value, of course. But I suspect they have a much better idea (via data analysis) where it's most logical to locate chargers within the highway network to generate the most usage. At least on a macro level (general area).

 

[timbop]

Yeah, I suspect it's more of a "satisfy public input" checkbox than anything. Given that the company started up as a product of the punishment phase of legal action from the government, I can see how they'd want to dot every "i" and cross every "t".

Not that wishlist suggestions have zero value, of course. But I suspect they have a much better idea (via data analysis) where it's most logical to locate chargers within the highway network to generate the most usage. At least on a macro level (general area).

The way I read it there was a significant amount of feedback in the form of proposals (as opposed to site suggestions) from 4 government entities - which is more involved than "hey you should put one there". The point is that the US is a very big place and it would be extremely involved for EA to do a detailed EV traffic projection everywhere. EA likely weighed the received proposals heavily as significant interest. The lack of response from the mentioned states was also likely viewed as apathy toward EVs. To put it succinctly: the "squeaky wheel gets the grease", and the coasts were very vocal.

excerpt from document:
In January 2018, Electrify America launched a page on its website for comments, proposals, data, and recommendations to help define Cycle 2 investments. As of October 14, 2018, 780 submissions were received through the online portal. 4 Government entities made up 39% of submissions

 

[timbop]

Here's a breakdown of the submissions, less than a quarter of which were individuals:

 

[dbsb3233]

Oh sure, it wasn't just individuals submitting wishlists. But that's still what they amount to. You're right that the squeakiest wheels often get the most grease. (Or at least the earliest, anyway.)

Although the point of their network isn't just to serve locals. It's to serve travelers too. Thus why we see those stations along interstates where there's not much EV penetration yet.

For local usage, EA really didn't have to look much further than vehicle registration stats...

 

[ChasingCoral]

Oh sure, it wasn't just individuals submitting wishlists. But that's still what they amount to. You're right that the squeakiest wheels often get the most grease. (Or at least the earliest, anyway.)

Sounds like it's time for us to start squeaking. Anyone find the "suggest a location" page?

 

[timbop]

Oh sure, it wasn't just individuals submitting wishlists. But that's still what they amount to. You're right that the squeakiest wheels often get the most grease. (Or at least the earliest, anyway.)

Although the point of their network isn't just to serve locals. It's to serve travelers too. Thus why we see those stations along interstates where there's not much EV penetration yet.

For local usage, EA really didn't have to look much further than vehicle registration stats...

That's a great chart, and it definitely illustrates where the BEV hotspots are. Comparing that to the EA charging map there is a lot of correlation of the "dead spots" like Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas. The EA chart clearly maps to major routes, which is likely why Michigan north of Detroit is also a charging desert.

It's the classic catch-22: fewer people in those areas buy EV's because there's poor charging infrastructure, and there's no infrastructure because people don't buy EV's in those areas. Things will improve over time of course, but for now it sucks to be in one of those underserved areas.

 

[dbsb3233]

The more I think about it, a better chart would have been one with raw numbers of EVs rather than a share. From a charging station demand standpoint, it's the total count of EVs that matters, not the %.

That's the real issue up north around the Dakotas -- very little demand for charging stations because there's very few EVs and a very large area to cover. They're just very low density states. The cities (where EVs are mainly useful) are small, and there's many hundreds of miles of empty rural stretches (where EVs are a poor fit).

To cover I-90 or I-94, EA would have to put in a lot of stations for such a long stretch. It's over 1000 miles from Minneapolis to Butte. With very little population and very little expected usage to produce sales revenue. It's no surprise that area hasn't been included in the early phases.

 

[timbop]

The more I think about it, a better chart would have been one with raw numbers of EVs rather than a share. From a charging station demand standpoint, it's the total count of EVs that matters, not the %.

That's the real issue up north around the Dakotas -- very little demand for charging stations because there's very few EVs and a very large area to cover. They're just very low density states. The cities (where EVs are mainly useful) are small, and there's many hundreds of miles of empty rural stretches (where EVs are a poor fit).

To cover I-90 or I-94, EA would have to put in a lot of stations for such a long stretch. It's over 1000 miles from Minneapolis to Butte. With very little population and very little expected usage to produce sales revenue. It's no surprise that area hasn't been included in the early phases.

True, but the same situation applied to gas stations a century ago. The difference of course is that one can charge at home so demand for on the road charging will be much less than for gas pumps

 

[ChasingCoral]

True, but the same situation applied to gas stations a century ago. The difference of course is that one can charge at home so demand for on the road charging will be much less than for gas pumps

And a century ago there were people still sticking with their horses. They charged up at home, too, but were slower. Now we get a really fast horse that charges up at home.

 

[timbop]

And a century ago there were people still sticking with their horses. They charged up at home, too, but were slower. Now we get a really fast horse that charges up at home.

Right - but that's the point: people "charged" their horses at home because it was cheaper and easy to store feed, so there weren't stables gratuitously placed everywhere. Conversely gas stations are ubiquitous because it is impractical and messy to store gasoline and fill your car at your home, so gas stations became available everywhere after a decade or two.

Put another way: ALL ICE vehicles on the road have to go to a gas station on a regular basis, but BEV's can be driven indefinitely without ever going to a charging station. Not only does that make determining if a given location is appropriate for a charging station, it also affects the economics of it. The cost of a gas station is amortized over a much larger sales volume compared to a charging station, so one needs to have a much higher margin per sale. That higher margin is a disincentive to use public charging unless you have no other choice.

 

[dbsb3233]

And a century ago there were people still sticking with their horses. They charged up at home, too, but were slower. Now we get a really fast horse that charges up at home.

That's where the analogy doesn't really fit well though. Because automobiles were a quantum leap in functionality compared to a horse.

But BEVs aren't (as compared to ICE). In fact if anything, they're a bit less functional than ICE vehicles and require more compromise because of the slow refueling.

They have their pros and cons, of course, but in terms of basic functionality, they're basically a lateral move rather than a quantum leap like autos vs horses was.

 

[Billyk24]

Another EA site has come on line. The totals now (May 11 2020) read:
428 total sites-111 future sites, 1467 total CCS chargers, 428 CHAdeMo chargers, 97 level 2 chargers

March 1, 2020 we had 409 total site
Feb 1, 2020 we had 398 total sites with 77 future sites planned.

 

[ClaudeMach-E]

It would be nice if Electrify Canada would be has good has Electrify America.

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