9 ms·

There's no physical reason why there can't be municipal on street charging, even if it's "pay to charge." Think like parking meters. There just needs to be a d

by astura 8y ago

There's no physical reason why there can't be municipal on street charging, even if it's "pay to charge." Think like parking meters. There just needs to be a demand for the initial infrastructure to be built.

Eric_WVGG 8y ago
We can't even handle parking meters out here, though.
perl4ever 8y ago
I think there is a "physical" reason, or to be exact, a concrete logical reason why it will be difficult. We have X number of gas pumps. If it takes Y times the amount of time to charge a car as pumping fuel, then we need X*Y chargers for everyone to go electric. It's not just a matter of what's convenient, but of multiplying the infrastructure.
- taneq 8y ago
  Yes, but the power grid is already in place (although it'll probably need upgrading, piecemeal, to handle the additional load). You couldn't run a gas pipeline to every kerbside parking spot but you could put a paid charge point there and it would pay for itself in no time.
  - kwhitefoot 8y ago
    > although it'll probably need upgrading, piecemeal, to handle the additional load Not necessarily, see this document from the UK National Grid which discusses the options: https://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/articles/electric-dreams-future-evs https://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/articles/electric-dreams-fut...
sunstone 8y ago
And, at an equivalent of about $1 a gallon, lots of people will get on that.
gambiting 8y ago
So my local council doesn't even have the money to stay on top of fixing potholes and uneven streets , but will somehow find the money and will to put electric charging points everywhere? Yeah, I don't see that happening.
- rgbrenner 8y ago
  they put in parking meters to collect money. Are you sure they wouldn't put in charging meters with the equivalent price of gas? That's worth maybe 15k mi/yr / 30mpg * $3 = $1500/yr for the average user (assuming they use it regularly.. which apartment users would). That seems like a pretty decent incentive.
  - Marsymars 8y ago
    Why would someone buy an electric car if they had to pay the equivalent price of gas to charge it?
    - colordrops 8y ago
      It would in all likelihood still be cheaper than gas, but even if it weren't, electric cars are just that much better all around. After you've driven one for a while, you realize what a smelly complicated Rube Goldberg mess the internal combustion engine is.
      - Marsymars 8y ago
        To each their own, but I work for a service provider tangential to the auto industry, so I've had the chance to drive a lot of different cars, and I'm pretty ambivalent about electric vs ICE cars. None of the engineering complexity of an ICE (and associated components) is particularly relevant to me as a car owner, and we've been building them for long enough that despite their complexity, they're extremely reliable.
        colordrops 8y ago

by astura 8y ago

Eric_WVGG 8y ago

We can't even handle parking meters out here, though.

perl4ever 8y ago

I think there is a "physical" reason, or to be exact, a concrete logical reason why it will be difficult. We have X number of gas pumps. If it takes Y times the amount of time to charge a car as pumping fuel, then we need X*Y chargers for everyone to go electric. It's not just a matter of what's convenient, but of multiplying the infrastructure.

taneq 8y ago
Yes, but the power grid is already in place (although it'll probably need upgrading, piecemeal, to handle the additional load). You couldn't run a gas pipeline to every kerbside parking spot but you could put a paid charge point there and it would pay for itself in no time.
- kwhitefoot 8y ago
  > although it'll probably need upgrading, piecemeal, to handle the additional load Not necessarily, see this document from the UK National Grid which discusses the options: https://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/articles/electric-dreams-future-evs https://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/articles/electric-dreams-fut...

sunstone 8y ago

And, at an equivalent of about $1 a gallon, lots of people will get on that.

gambiting 8y ago

So my local council doesn't even have the money to stay on top of fixing potholes and uneven streets , but will somehow find the money and will to put electric charging points everywhere? Yeah, I don't see that happening.

rgbrenner 8y ago
they put in parking meters to collect money. Are you sure they wouldn't put in charging meters with the equivalent price of gas? That's worth maybe 15k mi/yr / 30mpg * $3 = $1500/yr for the average user (assuming they use it regularly.. which apartment users would). That seems like a pretty decent incentive.
- Marsymars 8y ago
  Why would someone buy an electric car if they had to pay the equivalent price of gas to charge it?
  - colordrops 8y ago
    It would in all likelihood still be cheaper than gas, but even if it weren't, electric cars are just that much better all around. After you've driven one for a while, you realize what a smelly complicated Rube Goldberg mess the internal combustion engine is.
    - Marsymars 8y ago
      To each their own, but I work for a service provider tangential to the auto industry, so I've had the chance to drive a lot of different cars, and I'm pretty ambivalent about electric vs ICE cars. None of the engineering complexity of an ICE (and associated components) is particularly relevant to me as a car owner, and we've been building them for long enough that despite their complexity, they're extremely reliable.
      - colordrops 8y ago