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Are we going to end up overbuilding our EV infrastructure because people don’t intuitively grasp that most of their charging can be done at home?

dymk 4y ago
Better over than under. And if we overbuild, then just wait for the market to catch up to available capacity before building more.
InefficientRed 4y ago
Sets of 4 chargers interspersed along major interstates and highways, which are exactly the settings (long hauls/roadtrips) where you really do need chargers away from home.
- wumpus 4y ago
  4 chargers per location?! That's not a good way to have reliability.
  - InefficientRed 4y ago
    4 chargers per install. I'd assume multiple installs per location in some cases but not others.
    - wumpus 4y ago
      That's pretty confusing. Chargers don't naturally come in multiples of 4. Sometime hardware is multiples of 1 or 2.
      - InefficientRed 4y ago
        but they will bid out the entire install and possibly even design. Gas pumps come in multiples of 1 or 2 but gas station design & construction happens in larger units of pumps & aren't bid in a "pick any multiple of 1 or 2 pumps" way. Does that make sense?
        wumpus 4y ago
        It makes sense that there's an economy of scale, and standardized designs are good, but the number 4 doesn't seem to be special in any way.
        InefficientRed 4y ago
        Right, I don't think it's special, other than perhaps as "this is the absolute minimum of chargers we'd ever want to put in a single place, and we're good with multiples of 4".
colechristensen 4y ago
Most isn’t all and a lot of places will be inaccessible if you don’t build out.
- abirch 4y ago
  You're right. Especially in rural areas when you need the extra range.
qgin 4y ago
I'd love to see some modeling of charging demand based on travel patterns. Something that takes into account trips that take into consideration trips that would be served by overnight home charging vs need for freestanding charging out in the wild.
cortesoft 4y ago
If we expect electric cars to replace all gas powered cars, we have to have places for all the apartment dwellers to charge, as well as for all the people who are driving on long trips. Even with the limited number of Teslas on the road right now, I ended up having to wait for over an hour for a spot to charge while driving from Northern California to Southern California on a holiday weekend. The station had 40 superchargers and still had over and hour wait to get to them. If every single driver on I-5 had to stop to charge, you will need a LOT of charging stations.
- fomine3 4y ago
  If we expect electric cars to replace all gas powered cars, finally every parking for apartment must have slow charger, isn't it? I think this is easier, cheaper, efficient, and useful way than having supercharger everywhere. Supercharger at highway must be encouraged for long trip.
version_five 4y ago
Overbuilding? I regularly stop at highway rest stops to get gas and have to wait on line at an 8 pump gas station they takes minutes per fill. If people were using electric cars with similarly distributed infrastructure that took 1/2 hour or more to charge, it would be impossible to go anywhere. I don't understand how it moves from niche to mass adoption, but under the current system, I guess it involves an insane amount of chargers Edit: my point above is that I'm talking about highway rest stops which are presumably exclusively frequented by people on long road trips. Maybe some started without a full tank, but the majority are gassing up to extend their range, and my point is that current infrastructure already gets bogged down with that despite the comparatively high speed of filling a gas tank.
- peter422 4y ago
  Most EV owners will only need to charge at these types of chargers when on long road trips, which are likely to be infrequent (for most drivers). Overnight charging is all you need for any daily driving <300 miles. Everybody needs to go to the gas station whether they are road tripping or a local. It’s not the same for EVs.
  - vanilla_nut 4y ago
    Everyone who owns a charger, most likely in a garage, attached to a single-family home is != everyone. It’s a good point, that theoretically you’ll have fewer users at electric charging stations because individuals can self-charge. But when most homes don’t have an electric charger, and many will never have an electric charger, that might not be as big a difference as you think. My last apartment was a very nice condo and there were two electric chargers in the basement. Not sure if I could rely on that for every day commuting needs.
    - matthewdgreen 4y ago
      I mean this sounds bad but also eminently fixable. Compared to, say, replacing a condo roof the problem of installing a few new chargers is about the most straightforward capital improvement you could imagine.
Grim-444 4y ago
There's more use cases for vehicles than driving around a major city, I use my vehicle as more than a grocery fetcher. I routinely drive hundreds of miles, I'm routinely in remote areas, I really value freedom of movement. At the moment an EV is completely out of the question for me because the infrastructure isn't remotely close to what would support my use case. I guess if you want to convert more people to EVs you need to actually build out a system I'd be interested in using.
- InefficientRed 4y ago
  > I'm routinely in remote areas Are those remote areas clogged with your next door neighbors? Or are they mostly empty? > you need to actually build out a system I'd be interested in using. Nah. You're an (extreme) edge case.
  - shukantpal 4y ago
    > Nah. You're an (extreme) edge case. False.
    - InefficientRed 4y ago
      The average gas-powered car has a 300 mile range. I drive to remote areas fairly often. I cannot get to these areas in my daily driver because I don't have enough range! It's an extreme outlier scenario.
- Tagbert 4y ago
  Once we have the vehicles and infrastructure to support the other 95% of the population, maybe things will be good enough that you might find an EV or similar for your needs.
glowingly 4y ago
I would love to charge at home. My landlord doesn't quite agree. I would love to own my own home. In the meantime, I will accept other EV charging initiatives.
stetrain 4y ago
We are currently far from overbuilding. Home charging is great and means we don't need EV chargers everywhere we currently have gas stations. But highway chargers need to handle peak demand for highway travel, including holidays. And we do need lots of slow chargers for those who can't install their own home charger. City street parking, offices, parking garages, apartment buildings, etc.
amluto 4y ago
Even if we overbuild EV chargers, it doesn’t seem nearly as bad as overbuilding gas stations. Abandoned gas stations turn into nasty environmental messes — tanks leak, things spilled on the ground soak in, etc. Abandobed EV chargers are parking spaces with smallish, harmless machines that may even have some scrap value.
- darknavi 4y ago
  > that may even have some scrap value. Charging cables are already being scalped for copper unfortunately.

dymk 4y ago

Better over than under. And if we overbuild, then just wait for the market to catch up to available capacity before building more.

InefficientRed 4y ago

Sets of 4 chargers interspersed along major interstates and highways, which are exactly the settings (long hauls/roadtrips) where you really do need chargers away from home.

wumpus 4y ago
4 chargers per location?! That's not a good way to have reliability.
- InefficientRed 4y ago
  4 chargers per install. I'd assume multiple installs per location in some cases but not others.
  - wumpus 4y ago
    That's pretty confusing. Chargers don't naturally come in multiples of 4. Sometime hardware is multiples of 1 or 2.
    - InefficientRed 4y ago
      but they will bid out the entire install and possibly even design. Gas pumps come in multiples of 1 or 2 but gas station design & construction happens in larger units of pumps & aren't bid in a "pick any multiple of 1 or 2 pumps" way. Does that make sense?
      - wumpus 4y ago
        It makes sense that there's an economy of scale, and standardized designs are good, but the number 4 doesn't seem to be special in any way.
        InefficientRed 4y ago
        Right, I don't think it's special, other than perhaps as "this is the absolute minimum of chargers we'd ever want to put in a single place, and we're good with multiples of 4".

colechristensen 4y ago

Most isn’t all and a lot of places will be inaccessible if you don’t build out.

abirch 4y ago
You're right. Especially in rural areas when you need the extra range.

qgin 4y ago

I'd love to see some modeling of charging demand based on travel patterns. Something that takes into account trips that take into consideration trips that would be served by overnight home charging vs need for freestanding charging out in the wild.

cortesoft 4y ago

If we expect electric cars to replace all gas powered cars, we have to have places for all the apartment dwellers to charge, as well as for all the people who are driving on long trips. Even with the limited number of Teslas on the road right now, I ended up having to wait for over an hour for a spot to charge while driving from Northern California to Southern California on a holiday weekend. The station had 40 superchargers and still had over and hour wait to get to them. If every single driver on I-5 had to stop to charge, you will need a LOT of charging stations.

fomine3 4y ago
If we expect electric cars to replace all gas powered cars, finally every parking for apartment must have slow charger, isn't it? I think this is easier, cheaper, efficient, and useful way than having supercharger everywhere. Supercharger at highway must be encouraged for long trip.

version_five 4y ago

Overbuilding? I regularly stop at highway rest stops to get gas and have to wait on line at an 8 pump gas station they takes minutes per fill. If people were using electric cars with similarly distributed infrastructure that took 1/2 hour or more to charge, it would be impossible to go anywhere. I don't understand how it moves from niche to mass adoption, but under the current system, I guess it involves an insane amount of chargers Edit: my point above is that I'm talking about highway rest stops which are presumably exclusively frequented by people on long road trips. Maybe some started without a full tank, but the majority are gassing up to extend their range, and my point is that current infrastructure already gets bogged down with that despite the comparatively high speed of filling a gas tank.

peter422 4y ago
Most EV owners will only need to charge at these types of chargers when on long road trips, which are likely to be infrequent (for most drivers). Overnight charging is all you need for any daily driving <300 miles. Everybody needs to go to the gas station whether they are road tripping or a local. It’s not the same for EVs.
- vanilla_nut 4y ago
  Everyone who owns a charger, most likely in a garage, attached to a single-family home is != everyone. It’s a good point, that theoretically you’ll have fewer users at electric charging stations because individuals can self-charge. But when most homes don’t have an electric charger, and many will never have an electric charger, that might not be as big a difference as you think. My last apartment was a very nice condo and there were two electric chargers in the basement. Not sure if I could rely on that for every day commuting needs.
  - matthewdgreen 4y ago
    I mean this sounds bad but also eminently fixable. Compared to, say, replacing a condo roof the problem of installing a few new chargers is about the most straightforward capital improvement you could imagine.

Grim-444 4y ago

There's more use cases for vehicles than driving around a major city, I use my vehicle as more than a grocery fetcher. I routinely drive hundreds of miles, I'm routinely in remote areas, I really value freedom of movement. At the moment an EV is completely out of the question for me because the infrastructure isn't remotely close to what would support my use case. I guess if you want to convert more people to EVs you need to actually build out a system I'd be interested in using.

InefficientRed 4y ago
> I'm routinely in remote areas Are those remote areas clogged with your next door neighbors? Or are they mostly empty? > you need to actually build out a system I'd be interested in using. Nah. You're an (extreme) edge case.
- shukantpal 4y ago
  > Nah. You're an (extreme) edge case. False.
  - InefficientRed 4y ago
    The average gas-powered car has a 300 mile range. I drive to remote areas fairly often. I cannot get to these areas in my daily driver because I don't have enough range! It's an extreme outlier scenario.
Tagbert 4y ago
Once we have the vehicles and infrastructure to support the other 95% of the population, maybe things will be good enough that you might find an EV or similar for your needs.

glowingly 4y ago

I would love to charge at home. My landlord doesn't quite agree. I would love to own my own home. In the meantime, I will accept other EV charging initiatives.

stetrain 4y ago

We are currently far from overbuilding. Home charging is great and means we don't need EV chargers everywhere we currently have gas stations. But highway chargers need to handle peak demand for highway travel, including holidays. And we do need lots of slow chargers for those who can't install their own home charger. City street parking, offices, parking garages, apartment buildings, etc.

amluto 4y ago

Even if we overbuild EV chargers, it doesn’t seem nearly as bad as overbuilding gas stations. Abandoned gas stations turn into nasty environmental messes — tanks leak, things spilled on the ground soak in, etc. Abandobed EV chargers are parking spaces with smallish, harmless machines that may even have some scrap value.

darknavi 4y ago
> that may even have some scrap value. Charging cables are already being scalped for copper unfortunately.