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Cost of public EV charging rises by more than 42% in four months
- LeoPanthera 4y ago* In the UK.
- Choco31415 4y agoCurious - how much would charging costs have to increase for the cost of driving an EV to match that of an ICE car?
- LeoPanthera 4y agoThis article is talking about the cost of public charging (in the UK), which is much more expensive that charging at home, which of course is where the vast majority of EV charging occurs. So the answer depends on where and when you charge.
- 2000UltraDeluxe 4y agoTo elaborate: If you're using public chargers only, EV's are already more expensive than ICE cars in parts of Europe. The energy market is rather... interesting at the moment.
- ramraj07 4y agoAs it should be.. public chargers are quite expensive infra-wise since they need to support fast charging.
- gambiting 4y agoWhat do you mean they "need" to support fast charging? Majority of public charging points in this country are just type 2, 3.6/7.2kW chargers, CCS rapid chargers are outnumbered probably 1:10. And a simple 7.2kW point costs about £1500-2000 to install(commercially, at home it's cheaper) - hardly an extravagant expense.
- buro9 4y agoThe vast majority of people in the UK do not have their own private driveway adjoining their property. Everyone I personally know uses public charging. Currently the way people are going is to know which car parks and shops still have free charging and to use those but they all know it doesn't work in the long run.
- highwaylights 4y agoI see more and more of the public chargers with trash bags taped over them, which is a bit sad I guess, but probably a sign of the times we're living in now.
- tirant 4y agoAldi Süd was one of the typical free charging locations. Since this summer they have closed all their chargers and they plan now to start charging around 0.40€/kWh.
- shapefrog 4y ago"The hike in price means drivers who only use the public network to charge vehicles pay around 18p per mile for electricity. That is just 1p less per mile for a petrol car, based on someone driving at an average of 40 miles to the gallon, the motoring group said. The cost per mile for charging electric vehicles at home is around 9p per mile for the average-sized car. The BBC has been told most EV drivers charge at home overnight." https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63029226 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63029226 64p per kWh vs £1.90 per litre looks like parity between the two ~3 kWh ~= 1 litre petrol a fair estimate (~11 kWh ~= 1 us gallon)? Obviously your mileage may vary.
- dr_dshiv 4y agoIf you live inside a European city, how do you charge your car? I don’t see cords going inside of windows… I only ever see public spots. What gives?
- dncornholio 4y agoHave an EV-plug installed into the side of my house. I run a cable over the crosswalk to the car from there.
- this_is_not_you 4y ago"Inside a European city" is quite a broad concept. Some people will indeed have parking next to where they live. Otherwise the next best option is to charge the car at the place they work if they commute by car and their employer offers that. Other options are to include charging into your mental overhead and use options whenever you are out shopping (larger supermarkets with parking often have charging options), training (parking next to football fields might have charging), use public charging spots but that can be time consuming when your next one is further away. Source: We own an electric car and charge at home but we recently considered moving to a place without home charging and had to figure out how we would deal with that.
- dr_dshiv 4y ago< “Inside a European city” is quite a broad concept Is it though? Paris, London, Berlin, Amsterdam, Madrid, Rome… dominated by 3-5 story mixed-use, with some special area for skyscrapers, and farmland near to the edge of the city. (Or, near by American standards) “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”
- Hamuko 4y agoAre you talking about fuel cost alone or all costs? Because the cost structure is very different and depends a lot on the region. You might have a higher upfront cost because EVs tend to be pricier than their ICE counterparts, but you might save on road taxes (at least if they're based on CO2 emissions) and on regular service, but lose out on things like tyre/suspension wear (heavy cars, lots of torque) and insurance (at least Tesla rates are insane).
- ls15 4y agoI can buy 10 used but running ICE cars for the price of an EV and could probably buy a couple of years worth of gas for the money that I saved, even at current prices. We need some actually cheap EVs, so probably models that are not so full of electronics like the current ones. Just some basic models without self-driving hocus pocus and futuristic bling. I also would never buy a car that keeps up a constant network connection to its manufacturer, so that's a requirement I'd be looking for as well.
- Underphil 4y agoYou and me both, but I think we're the minority. I want bell-and-whistle free ICE cars when I buy but those are becoming harder and harder to obtain.
- ls15 4y agoI'd be fine with a bell-and-whistle-free EV as well. I think there are just none on the market, except a couple of Chinese models that you cannot try before you buy from a Western country.
- vincnetas 4y agoGet VW eUP. It's discontinued but you could find year old ones. So almost new. Perfect city car.
- gambiting 4y ago>>We need some actually cheap EVs, so probably models that are not so full of electronics like the current ones. Just some basic models without self-driving hocus pocus and futuristic bling. Those exist, just buy yourself an e-Up/Citigo EV/Mii Electric, it's very cheap, it's very basic, has 160 miles range, it even comes with a normal analogue cluster. Or another cheap choice is an MG ZS EV or EV5 - both fantastic cars, both pretty basic without a whole lot of tech.
- ls15 4y agoMore affordable than Tesla, but still 10x of the cheap used ICEV that they are competing with. But basic? https://www.just-auto.com/analysis/interior-design-and-technology-seat-mii/ https://www.just-auto.com/analysis/interior-design-and-techn... > The Mii doesn’t offer a built-in touchscreen – not even as an option. Instead, it comes fitted with a smartphone dock located on top of the dash. While it may appear low-tech compared to its rivals, it does the job by allowing the driver to link their phone to the car via two apps: Mii Drive and SEAT Connect. The latter provides remote access and management of the vehicle, so drivers can review driving data, parking position, the vehicle’s status, including doors and lights, manage the charging process via the e-Manager and the ability to control air-conditioning remotely from the app. How to repair this at home if it breaks? Can I make sure that my car does not send any data to the manufacturer?
- moandcompany 4y agoFor EV drivers mostly relying on public, "fast" charging, their energy costs are getting extremely close to, and can exceed, the fuel costs of ICE drivers. The main way for the energy costs to be cheaper for EV drivers relies on charging at home or at work where it may be subsidized/free. Using Anecdata from the United States The energy or fuel cost of driving an EV versus an ICE car varies primarily based on the following factors: - Where and When the EV is being charged (e.g. at Home versus at a Public Charging Station) - Cost of Electricity in the Region - Cost of Gasoline in the Region Let's use the state of California for an example and calculate the general fuel/energy cost per mile driven. Where and When: Some residential power customers are on time-of-use billing plans which typically charge premium rates during peak hours (daytime-to-early evening, and substantially cheaper rates during off-peak hours. Pricing can also go up by usage tiers. Some EV drivers are able to charge exclusively at home, and/or have subsidized charging at work. It's almost always more economical for the EV driver to charge at home/work, however home/office chargers will typically be limited to not-"fast" charging speeds (L1 or L2 charging). The average residential electricity rate in California is ~$0.30/kWh. Many Public EV charging stations offer "fast" (L3) charging speeds and are convenient or necessary to use for some EV drivers. Many California public EV charging stations also now have variable pricing based on time of day and their location. The rates can vary from ~$0.30-$0.50+/kWh at EVgo stations or Tesla Superchargers, as examples. Typical EV efficiencies I've seen are around 3.5-4.0 miles driven per kWh consumed. Assuming the upper end of 4.0 mi/kWh, the energy cost per mile driven is around $0.08/mi at the low end, and $0.13+/mi at the upper end with the above energy prices. If we assume an ICE or hybrid vehicle with average fuel economy of 35mi/gallon, and gasoline costs typically range from $4.50-$5.50/gallon, the fuel cost per mile driven is around $0.13/mi at the low end and $0.16+/mi at the higher end. For fun, if we took a typical Toyota Prius from the last 10+ years, with average fuel economy of 50mi/gallon, the fuel cost per mile driven is around $0.09/mi at the low end and $0.11+/mi at the higher end. The prices for Public EV charging fluctuate, as do the prices for gasoline. Generally, if someone is driving an EV and primarily relying on public "fast" charging, their energy cost per mile driven is really not that different from the ICE car examples, and higher than the average Prius driver. (I have an EV and ICE vehicles)
- dmitriid 4y ago
- friendzis 4y agoYou cannot give one figure here. The only comparable metric is cost per km or equivalent consumption (which is basically the same thing in different units), which is function on 4 variables: ICE/BEV consumption and electricity/fuel price. Fuel cost equivalent BEV consumption (expressed in fuel per distance, e.g. l/100km) is equal to [C_e * P_e] / P_f = C_e * [P_e / P_f]; where C_e = BEV electricity consumption; P_e = Price of electricity; P_f = Price of fuel. With C_e = 20 kWh/100km; you need [P_e / P_f] ~= 0,35 to break even. With fuel prices in the [1.7 -- 1.9] range you need electricity prices in [0.59 -- 0.67] range. Sibling comments list UK prices to be P_e = 0.65; P_f = 1.9; yielding equivalent consumption is 6.8 l/100km. (34.5 mpg according to google) In my country prices are roughly P_e = 0.59; P_f = [1.65 -- 1.75] giving equivalent consumption of roughly [7.15 -- 6.75]. BEV consumption is a bitch for comparison. Your trip computer displays battery-to-controller consumption, which is what you pay at public charger, but when charging at home you pay for grid consumption which includes charging losses.
- ridiculous_fish 4y agoHere in San Jose, CA, I have one of the most efficient EVs on the market (4 miles per kWH) and my off-peak charging rate is 25c/kWH ($0.25) which is high relative to other states. That's 6.25 cents per mile. For comparison a 30 MPG car at $5/gallon is 16.7 cents per mile. So your answer in my situation is 2.7x. One can reasonably quibble about other costs but what surprised me is that it's within an order of magnitude.
- saagarjha 4y agoIf you have a Leaf, it's not too hard to push it past 4.5 mi/kWh ;) We're on the same plan as you are, and last week we found that charging it at the office (which used to be significantly more expensive than at home) is now 2x cheaper that it is from our garage, so that's where we're going to all our charging from now on. Electricity prices for off-peak usage going from 5¢/kWh to 25¢/kWh at home really hurts. I get free charging at work, but alas I bike so the car gets charged at the other office…
- sideshowb 4y agoThe most efficient ice cars get 60mpg so comparing like with like it's even closer!
- fyvhbhn 4y agoExternal costs included?
- tmikaeld 4y agoThe article is in UK, but prices have started to go up on some public charging in Sweden too. Some are at 0.7€/KwH, which is more expensive than using a gasoline car, despite high fuel prices (Especially in the winter) Fast charging always has a premium price though, due to availability and higher load on cables/stations.
- ls15 4y agoWhen I see EVs that are charging at public spots in cities, I assume that the owners for some reason do not care about money. Either because their are rich, or because it is some kind of business expense for them.
- tmikaeld 4y agoLower-cost EVs have a limited battery capacity, so it's unavoidable when traveling between cities. Charging at night with hourly pricing, is just 0.06€/KwH (Sweden) (But going up due to industries switching to night shifts..).
- ls15 4y ago> 0.06€/KwH Is that in the UK? I think in Germany the cost for providers is already above 0.20€/KwH at the moment and the prices at home are typically higher. Mine is about 0.40€/KwH at the moment.
- tmikaeld 4y agoSouth Sweden, if we didn't export huge amounts of energy to Germany and shut down 4 nuclear plants (With 20+ years left of life), it would be a permanent < 0.06/KwH.
- Hamuko 4y agoNight-time electricity can be practically free at times, since people are asleep and a lot of businesses aren't operating. You just need to be on a plan where you pay different rates during the day and night.
- Gigachad 4y agoCosts of petrol in Australia went up 100% in that long recently.
- turtlebits 4y agoThis is for DC fast charging, which is always the most expensive. I only use them when taking road trips, if necessary. Fast charging where I live is around 3.5x residential rates per kWh.
- habibur 4y agoRead it. Only in Europe, and because of surge in their power cost. Would have been better if the title reflected it.
- shapefrog 4y agoautocar.co.uk - Article is about the UK, not "in Europe" but of course you read it so you are fully aware of this
- mellavora 4y agoHuh. I saw an article the other day which was only about the US, and the bad stuff was only because of a US specific event. And there were also a couple of articles which really only applied to California. Really, who cares about health impacts from wildfire smoke, it only affects livability in a few parts of the world. Hey, sorry for the snarky tone, you deserve better. I'm just thinking of friends of mine whose mortgage cost just doubled. And thanks to the UK gilt meltdown, no banks are issuing mortgages.
- maximus-decimus 4y agoThe difference with an article about wildfire smoke is it would probably be obvious if it applies to you or not. This is more the equivalent of an article name "Air quality down 42% since last year!" and once you read the article you realize it only applies to people living in California because of fires.
- pjmlp 4y agoThanks for confirming what I was asserting a couple of days ago.
- anvic 4y agoBroom broom... (sound of me revving up as I hold down the clutch)
- Mashimo 4y agoThat's pretty baller :0
- switch007 4y agoI know the article is related to energy costs but: If for decades people have shown to pay £X for private travel in a car, why would business charge less than X? Governments will temporarily provide incentives etc because it’s greener but the biggest costs of EV are in the hands of private enterprise (purchase/lease, electricity suppliers, maintenance shops) and they’ll extract maximum profit. Anyone who thinks in the long term that EVs will cost a fraction of ICE are a bit naive imo
- beachy 4y ago> If for decades people have shown to pay £X for private travel in a car, why would business charge less than X? Because of the invisible hand of the market, thanks to the magic of competition.
- lm28469 4y agoWe forced the national electricity provider to open up to "competition" in France and it now is more expensive than ever. "Competition" isn't always a good thing If you don't believe in god you shouldn't believe in the magic hand of the market, because it essentially is the same thing
- beachy 4y agoJust speculating but perhaps true competition wasn't introduced? Are there 3 or 4 genuine competitors, who aren't just retail frontages for the same back end company? (that's the way telcos and power companies here can be structured).
- Noumenon72 4y agoFor decades people paid 2 cents for a nail[1]. Why do nails cost 0.5 cents now? Because once you figure out a way to make them cheaper than 2 cents, you can make more profit by charging less -- you take market share away from producers who can't go under two cents. This is a steady process that has been going on for centuries in all kinds of different products. If it doesn't happen with EVs, it will be because government intervened to stop it. [1] - https://conversableeconomist.blogspot.com/2012/04/price-of-nails.html https://conversableeconomist.blogspot.com/2012/04/price-of-n...
- Eleison23 4y agoThe EV charging infrastructure is going to have some reckoning before they can abolish ICE around these parts. I live in a dense multifamily housing community. There are 289 units and there's plenty of parking in the lot for all the cars. There are zero bicycle racks and it's not pleasant for pedestrians to access the property; it's built for cars. There are also zero EV charging stations, and I don't expect to see any. There are no garages for cars. There are not even electrical outlets that could be subverted nearby. That means that anyone who lives here is completely unable to charge an EV on the premises. It's out of the question. That's 289 families who must use and maintain an ICE car, or if they have bicycles they get to bring them upstairs and put them inside the apartment (bicycles not allowed on the porch or balcony.) There are hundreds of multifamily housing units in the area and we have no recycling program and we won't be seeing any EV charging stations. Nobody who lives like I do will be able to own an EV unless they are 100% able to charge while at work or running errands. It's out of the question and out of reach. This is the reality of the urban city environment: we are not yuppies with multi-car garages and 220V multi-phase circuits and photovoltaic panels on the roof. We are working poor with enough cash for a tank of gas and a quart of oil once in a while, and that's how it's going to stay. The only things that will supplant ICE vehicles in my neighborhood will be the public transit, the rideshare drivers, and shared scooters and bicycles. I already do plenty of commuting on electric scooters; that's the wave of the future around here - I let someone else worry about charging them!
- saagarjha 4y agoCharging at work is an option, assuming their workplace provides chargers. (I understand that this is a rose-tinted, tech company view…but it doesn't have to be.)
- kouiskas 4y agoI charge my EV with free solar energy 90% of the time. Can't dig my own gas out of the ground for an ICE. Hopefully that kind of setup will become cheaper and more accessible to many. EVs aside, every bare roof is a missed opportunity for solar anyway. It should be mandatory for every overground parking lot to be covered in solar panels, same for every newly built residential and office building. If this sort of policy was in place, there would be a lot more locally generated electricity for heating and charging EVs that doesn't need to be transported over long distances.
- dagurp 4y agoA really bad side effect is that in some European countries, people with hybrids have stopped charging their cars because it's cheaper to drive on petrol.
- kkfx 4y agoThere are few issues I think nobody want to accept: - living on renewable is possible in some parts of the inhabited earth, not all, essentially only where Sunlight + climate and|or hydro can be used enough for local residential needs; - it's doable ONLY for private homes, not for industries, or so to speak actual "RE" tech can't be built with itself; - it's doable only for few humans, not all those living already or relocatable toward eligible lands, starting from only those who can afford it. Now if you start telling people: "you can have $thing, you, you and you can't" those excluded start to revolt if such $thing is a key to mere living/living well enough. So someone have probably thought "well, we can push most in situations they can't revolt, to survive they can only accept" and that the mechanic of "universal revenues" etc in a prisons-alike "smart cities" (so dumb citizens) like those from https://youtu.be/Hx3DhoLFO4s https://youtu.be/Hx3DhoLFO4s those who can are also divided in two cohort, the rebels witch can perhaps just barely survive and those who are helpful who can profit A BIT, but not more than that of the new society. Are you think that's a crazy far-right stanza? Well, I came from a WWII Partisans family, so hardly nazi-fascist or clerical. BEVs have a handful of scale issue: - current substantial inability of recycling batteries and perhaps producing enough of them; - battery wight and stored energy limit that makes them substantially unfit for anything more than private cars, to a point that electrified roads would cost FAR LESS; - to charge quickly, but really quickly, they simply drain to much power witch is not an issue per se, but is a AC distribution network stability issue since they cause a sudden frequency drop anytime they start draining power. Such drop can't be sustained on scale. It can be correct with "smart-grid" features who mount and lower the load slowly enough to allow power plants to adapt but so far no such feature exists; - even really quick (300+ kW) chargers are not quick enough for long business trips, they can be ok only if you are on vacation, while the sole reasonable charging (from the Sun, locally generated electricity from a p.v. plant or hydro) hardly mach the current state of things. To correct IMVHO: - start mandate p.v. near-zero injection to the grid (allow just 1-3kW) to REDUCE grid frequency; - start subsidizing SMALL (8-10kWh) home batteries, enough to offer the minimum except heating/cooling without the Sun to power a whole home (fridge, VMCs, computers, lights etc) with two purposes: compensating small p.v. output fluctuations and small blackouts; - MANDATE home battery inverters high-voltage DC (400V) to DIRECTLY use (both directions) car battery for the home and to charge depending on p.v., no AC conversion needed; - mandate domestic p.v., 10kWp minimum WITH subsides, to buy a BEV. Those steps are the BARE minimum to get a sustainable amount of usable BEVs for those who can own/use them without causing grid issues. Oh surely, that means a far slower transition but ladies and gentleman transition will be slow ANYWAY because so far only possible at individual homes level, no technical way to "accelerate" at all beside a mass genocide.