Charging Issues Killing the EV?

Yes, there's an inequity between those who can charge at home at residential rates and those who can't and are dependent on public charging stations and consequently subject to substantially more expensive electricity.

 

It is not only the price. Those that charge at home for ~90% of the time aren't as affected by issues related to broken or busy DCFC, and seem to have a higher degree of satisfaction.

 

I agree with the author of the article 100%. I feel the same way about EVs. I love EVs. I have two of them. I don't go on long road trips very often, so I just charge them at home and it works out great. Our third car is a Honda Clarity PHEV. We use that for any road trips. I just don't want to deal with the inconvenience of planning charging stops, stopping for longer and dealing with so many broken or slow chargers. Been driving EVs for 6 years and I can count on one hand the amount of times I've used a DCFC.

The problem is, there are no "folks in charge of CCS infrastructure". Those folks don't exist, nobody has this responsibility. Most DCFC was built because of a lawsuit settlement or some government subsidy. There are incentives for installing chargers but NO incentive to anyone to keep them working. I wish we knew how much a company would need to charge for charging in order to make charging a profitable business. It needs to be a profitable business to provide incentives for companies to build reliable units and to keep them running.

Another government funded system not working... not exactly shocking.

 

Yes!

 

I think IEV had an article quite a while ago that argued that the only companies that make economic sense to install DCFC's are electricity utilities. The most prolific charging stations company here is BC it the province's utility, BC Hydro. They seem to be the best at advising via PlugShare when they are taking stations offline for maintenance and when they are available again.

 

I bought my Mini for commuting, powered mostly buy an EVSE in my car port. When I ordered it, DCFC was pretty sparse. I thought I should just keep my R53 for long trips. So, no, I'm not trading in. It is doing what I bought it for. I have done a few long trips in it, but no way would I do those regularly.

Plugshare has saved my butt a few times. I always check reports on my next charger before leaving.

Lots more DCFC have been installed in the last 14 months. But, dear God, the reliability and user experience is dreadful.

One Shell station I arrived at with only a few miles left was fully operational. Brand new and I'd used it 18 hours previously. But contractors had taped it off to paint the bays. Yep, I ducked under the tape and left tyre marks. Shell have been installing a lot of chargers in my area. Hopefully the problems are just teething and not cousins of Chargepoint's crippled children. 5/10

An EA I was at yesterday has been at severely reduced power for three frickin months. I got 42kWfrom the 350kW unit. Adequate for my SE. But the Lighting that pulled in to the bay next to me was pretty unhappy about the 24kW dribble that he was getting from a 150kW. EA, 6/10

Chargepoint? I've been trying to get a damn card from them for a year now. They seem incapable of sending me one. Ever tried using them with the app? I have about a 20% success rate, so I have to phone. They are a last resort in charging black holes. 2/10

EvGo has so far worked everytime. I initially avoided them as the per minute rate is very expensive for a 50kW car. They then switched to per kWh. I have been at several stations where not all chargers work, but no completely dead ones. After a few goes, I got plug and charge working. It mostly works. 8/10

I would not currently recommend a CCS vehicle to anyone in my area outside my use case: Mostly charge at home and grit your teeth for trips. The DCFC operators seem to be either incompetent or just don't care.

 

I've found the Duke Energy partnered stations to be better than the rest.

 

My first EV was a 2014 BMW i3-REx that CCS-1 taught:

• The vehicle, a BMW i3-REx, limited charging speed to 50 kW
• Charging at EA and EVgo costs 4 times more than premium gas between Huntsville AL and Nashville TN, ~120 miles
• One out of three attempts to charge at the Manchester EA station failed and I had to drive home on the range extender.
• Two attempts at EA required testing every charging stall including calls to customer service.

My Tesla using SuperChargers has occasionally found failed charging stalls but I just switched to another. The worst was:

I suspect someone with a pickup tow vehicle did this. It was repaired three weeks later.

Bob Wilson