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This also means that EVs aren't ready for people who can't charge at home, like most apartment renters or people in rental homes who drive too much for whatever

This also means that EVs aren't ready for people who can't charge at home, like most apartment renters or people in rental homes who drive too much for whatever outlet is available in their garage.

mellosouls 4y ago
In the UK it also includes the many, many people living on terraced streets with no off-road parking.
- borissk 4y ago
  People on therraced streets just park in front of their house and run a cable to charge the car.
  - mellosouls 4y ago
    Unsafe for obvious reasons, not remotely a practical solution. As others have pointed out there are real infrastructure problems, and not really difficult in cases like the above to sort technically, but nobody seems to be doing it practically, it's clearly in the power of the government and suppliers to do en masse if the intent is to encourage wide scale adoption.
seanmcdirmid 4y ago
At least in Europe if they have access to any outlet at all, they can usually get much better charging than we do in the states (240V vs 120V).
- Aloha 4y ago
  Do they? I dont think every outlet in Europe can do the 20a to 30a at 240v that you'd expect for a car charger - just like most outlets here are rated for 15a at 120, most outlets in the UK are rated for 13a at 240 (and thats on a ring circuit fused for 40a, which may be shared with many other outlets) - its a difference of about 1320w (in Germany 10a outlets are common, which means even less, a mere 600w difference) in actual power delivery. Whereas a dedicated home charging ciruit in states will be 4800-7200w. while yes, there is a difference, you dont know how many other devices that power line will pass, and it wont do in common space living situations where often exterior outlets are.. A) Shared and B) on the buildings meter, rather than the individuals.
  - seanmcdirmid 4y ago
    It often isn't as good as an L2 charger, but it is usually better than an American L1 charger. Incidentally, I already see this effect in using an electric water kettle: in the USA they are really slow, but in Europe and Asia, they are much faster (because 230-240V).
    - Aloha 4y ago
      L1.25 perhaps ;-) Point taken, and conceded in my original comment - the larger issues are, to suddenly add a bunch of high amperage loads at everyones parking space requires additional infrastructure - infrastructure we probably dont already have.
      - seanmcdirmid 4y ago
        I've never seen power outlets in shared parking in Europe, so I didn't really consider that case. I guess I'm just considering Europeans in SFHs, where they really don't need to worry about adding L2 wiring for most use cases.
        Symbiote 4y ago
        On-street and public-car-park chargers are very common. Scroll around https://chargefinder.com/ https://chargefinder.com/ I don't know about private parking, e.g. a car park reserved for residents of adjacent apartments. My building has two chargers, but it's not something I look out for elsewhere.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      A random search brought up a SMEG KLFO3 retro kettle at 3000w for the UK, the US get a Hamilton Beach 40869 - 1500 watts, so almost exactly half. If you really want to it is possible to wire 220/240 to an appropriate outlet in the US and have a 240v kettle, but some will be industrial - https://www.webstaurantstore.com/13957/commercial-coffee-makers-brewers-automatic.html?filter=style:single&filter=voltage:220-volts https://www.webstaurantstore.com/13957/commercial-coffee-mak...
- PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago
  Every US electrical grid connected site has access to 240V. It's just not the voltage at regular outlets, despite being trivially available from the main service panel.
  - seanmcdirmid 4y ago
    You need to wire it, which depending on how your garage is located vs your access panel, can be a few hundred dollars or a few thousand. In my case, we have to wrap around a cable (so $$$, but I also need a panel upgrade, so $$$$), but I've found L1 to work well enough for my usage.
rootusrootus 4y ago
Yes, continue to build out overnight grid access for the segment of the population that does not currently have it. That is a good idea. Are you suggesting otherwise that we all continue to drive gasoline cars until that happens, then it'll be okay to switch to electric?
- tehbeard 4y ago
  You seem to be taking an awfully defensive stance as if comment was from someone anti-EV, when in reality anyone reading it would see it merely points out issues with the current available infrastructure. I haven't heard much hullabaloo made about kerbside EV charging or such for apartment complexes or terraced housing etc in the UK. Is this something happening quietly, or not being invested in much like rural broadband wasnt?
  - rootusrootus 4y ago
    Normally the anti-EV crowd does tend to just drop in little nuggets to prove that we don't have a perfect world for EVs yet, without furthering the discussion of how we get to that point. Because they don't want to get there to begin with, burning gasoline is their preferred permanent solution. I do see a fair amount of quiet upgrading going on, at least in my area (in the US, not in UK, so I cannot speak to that). Having an EV charger is becoming a box you want to have checked on your rental property description, whether apartment or house. That doesn't mean we have a great solution in mind for curbside parking, mind you, but in most of the US that's a much less critical issue than apartment complexes which do have private parking lots.
    - notacoward 4y ago
      The one question the "EVs still pollute" crowd can never answer is what ICEV owners can do that's equivalent to installing your own solar (or soon wind) to harvest your own clean energy for a vehicle. Same to a certain extent with heat pumps vs. oil/gas heating for the home. They act like green technologies are as good and cheap as they can ever be, and do absolutely nothing to reduce emissions, when in fact progress is being made rapidly on both fronts. It's this one-sided view that makes them seem like allies of Big Oil, even if they don't mean to be.

This also means that EVs aren't ready for people who can't charge at home, like most apartment renters or people in rental homes who drive too much for whatever outlet is available in their garage.

mellosouls 4y ago

In the UK it also includes the many, many people living on terraced streets with no off-road parking.

borissk 4y ago
People on therraced streets just park in front of their house and run a cable to charge the car.
- mellosouls 4y ago
  Unsafe for obvious reasons, not remotely a practical solution. As others have pointed out there are real infrastructure problems, and not really difficult in cases like the above to sort technically, but nobody seems to be doing it practically, it's clearly in the power of the government and suppliers to do en masse if the intent is to encourage wide scale adoption.

seanmcdirmid 4y ago

At least in Europe if they have access to any outlet at all, they can usually get much better charging than we do in the states (240V vs 120V).

Aloha 4y ago
Do they? I dont think every outlet in Europe can do the 20a to 30a at 240v that you'd expect for a car charger - just like most outlets here are rated for 15a at 120, most outlets in the UK are rated for 13a at 240 (and thats on a ring circuit fused for 40a, which may be shared with many other outlets) - its a difference of about 1320w (in Germany 10a outlets are common, which means even less, a mere 600w difference) in actual power delivery. Whereas a dedicated home charging ciruit in states will be 4800-7200w. while yes, there is a difference, you dont know how many other devices that power line will pass, and it wont do in common space living situations where often exterior outlets are.. A) Shared and B) on the buildings meter, rather than the individuals.
- seanmcdirmid 4y ago
  It often isn't as good as an L2 charger, but it is usually better than an American L1 charger. Incidentally, I already see this effect in using an electric water kettle: in the USA they are really slow, but in Europe and Asia, they are much faster (because 230-240V).
  - Aloha 4y ago
    L1.25 perhaps ;-) Point taken, and conceded in my original comment - the larger issues are, to suddenly add a bunch of high amperage loads at everyones parking space requires additional infrastructure - infrastructure we probably dont already have.
    - seanmcdirmid 4y ago
      I've never seen power outlets in shared parking in Europe, so I didn't really consider that case. I guess I'm just considering Europeans in SFHs, where they really don't need to worry about adding L2 wiring for most use cases.
      - Symbiote 4y ago
        On-street and public-car-park chargers are very common. Scroll around https://chargefinder.com/ https://chargefinder.com/ I don't know about private parking, e.g. a car park reserved for residents of adjacent apartments. My building has two chargers, but it's not something I look out for elsewhere.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    A random search brought up a SMEG KLFO3 retro kettle at 3000w for the UK, the US get a Hamilton Beach 40869 - 1500 watts, so almost exactly half. If you really want to it is possible to wire 220/240 to an appropriate outlet in the US and have a 240v kettle, but some will be industrial - https://www.webstaurantstore.com/13957/commercial-coffee-makers-brewers-automatic.html?filter=style:single&filter=voltage:220-volts https://www.webstaurantstore.com/13957/commercial-coffee-mak...
PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago
Every US electrical grid connected site has access to 240V. It's just not the voltage at regular outlets, despite being trivially available from the main service panel.
- seanmcdirmid 4y ago
  You need to wire it, which depending on how your garage is located vs your access panel, can be a few hundred dollars or a few thousand. In my case, we have to wrap around a cable (so $$$, but I also need a panel upgrade, so $$$$), but I've found L1 to work well enough for my usage.

rootusrootus 4y ago

Yes, continue to build out overnight grid access for the segment of the population that does not currently have it. That is a good idea. Are you suggesting otherwise that we all continue to drive gasoline cars until that happens, then it'll be okay to switch to electric?

tehbeard 4y ago
You seem to be taking an awfully defensive stance as if comment was from someone anti-EV, when in reality anyone reading it would see it merely points out issues with the current available infrastructure. I haven't heard much hullabaloo made about kerbside EV charging or such for apartment complexes or terraced housing etc in the UK. Is this something happening quietly, or not being invested in much like rural broadband wasnt?
- rootusrootus 4y ago
  Normally the anti-EV crowd does tend to just drop in little nuggets to prove that we don't have a perfect world for EVs yet, without furthering the discussion of how we get to that point. Because they don't want to get there to begin with, burning gasoline is their preferred permanent solution. I do see a fair amount of quiet upgrading going on, at least in my area (in the US, not in UK, so I cannot speak to that). Having an EV charger is becoming a box you want to have checked on your rental property description, whether apartment or house. That doesn't mean we have a great solution in mind for curbside parking, mind you, but in most of the US that's a much less critical issue than apartment complexes which do have private parking lots.
  - notacoward 4y ago
    The one question the "EVs still pollute" crowd can never answer is what ICEV owners can do that's equivalent to installing your own solar (or soon wind) to harvest your own clean energy for a vehicle. Same to a certain extent with heat pumps vs. oil/gas heating for the home. They act like green technologies are as good and cheap as they can ever be, and do absolutely nothing to reduce emissions, when in fact progress is being made rapidly on both fronts. It's this one-sided view that makes them seem like allies of Big Oil, even if they don't mean to be.