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You'll never need that much power at home. Level 2 AC 240V 30-50A is fine for overnight charging. The way Tesla Supercharging works is by using a large bank of

You'll never need that much power at home. Level 2 AC 240V 30-50A is fine for overnight charging. The way Tesla Supercharging works is by using a large bank of batteries for the heavy bursts of power draw (>100kW) during the initial periods of charging when the battery is warm and at a low percent. The batteries at the station are backfilled with less current from the grid in the background during periods of low use. At least that is how I understand it. but yeah, maybe trucks with huge batteries may be able to take advantage of it down the road.

vegardx 3y ago
I don't know about the NA, but that is definitively not the case for most superchargers (or any other brand of fast chargers, for that matter) in Europe. Batteries are expensive so this is only done in very special cases. I know they've used battery banks at some of the electrical ferries in Norway, simply because the cost of running new high-voltage power lines was deemed more expensive and the schedule of the ferries makes it very easy to model. Power grids are quite large, so any fluctuations across the grid is going to be minimal. They are quite good at modeling these things, otherwise we'd have rolling blackouts quite often. For homes it's the last mile that's usually the biggest limiting factor. But I agree with what you said, for /most/ people anything more than 2kW (so 240V/10A) is more than enough to charge up overnight. A perk with CCS2 is the support for 3-phase power delivery. With very simple wiring and some smart(-ish) electronics you can opportunistically deliver around 11kW to a single car, or divide it with other house appliances or other cars. It's fairly common with 400V TN-system in some parts of Europe, which makes the support of 3-phase in CCS2 very handy.
- claar 3y ago
  Just a nit pick: 10A @ 240V isn't enough to charge my Tesla Model Y overnight from empty - but 30A @ 240V (7.2kW) is.
  - vegardx 3y ago
    Most people don't drive 500km per day, the average is closer to 50 or so. So on average, you could easily top of your battery pack on 240V/10A circuit. That would be around 10kWh, which you'll do in 5 hours. Double the average and you'll still be topped up next morning.
    - TexanFeller 3y ago
      Many people often travel regularly, like I do to visit family 150mi away. It would sure be nice to be able to charge while I'm at their house at a rate that would fill me back up. Range and charging speed matters, y'all shouldn't be just hand waving it away.
      - vegardx 3y ago
        It's not being hand waved away. You're just constructing scenarios that most people owning an electric vehicle will agree is such a non-issue that it's not really worth debating. There are plenty of fast chargers to fill the gaps. Many people travel regularly. Many people don't. That's how we ended up on the average being 50km.
        TexanFeller 3y ago
        > There are plenty of fast chargers to fill the gaps. Definitely not on the route to where my family lives. I checked last year when I was looking at EV, there's like a single L2 charger at a hotel on the whole route. I expect it will be several more years before the millions of us with family in the country can reasonably buy an EV.
        vegardx 3y ago
        I don't think I've ever claimed that EVs are suitable for everyone right now or that the infrastructure is there to fully replace every single scenario. The point is still that most people can have most of their needs met by a simple wall plug for charging. Chances are that you don't even need to charge on your 150 miles trip. Most modern BEVs will be able to take you anywhere from 300-350 miles on a single charge. In your scenario you could literally do a round trip and have a comfortable level of charge when you get home again.
- wilg 3y ago
  I don't think most NA superchargers have batteries either, though some definitely do, but I believe going forward they are likely to have "powerpacks" to support pickup and semi truck charging.
bombcar 3y ago
It could also be useful at homes to regulate power (assuming the grid connections/solar/batteries were all available), allowing you to charge faster when power is cheap, and pull way back (or even backfeed) when power is expensive. But it's mainly to try to get EV fillups to be gas-station like. If you can recharge a Tesla to 80% in 5 minutes, you've won.

vegardx 3y ago

I don't know about the NA, but that is definitively not the case for most superchargers (or any other brand of fast chargers, for that matter) in Europe. Batteries are expensive so this is only done in very special cases. I know they've used battery banks at some of the electrical ferries in Norway, simply because the cost of running new high-voltage power lines was deemed more expensive and the schedule of the ferries makes it very easy to model. Power grids are quite large, so any fluctuations across the grid is going to be minimal. They are quite good at modeling these things, otherwise we'd have rolling blackouts quite often. For homes it's the last mile that's usually the biggest limiting factor. But I agree with what you said, for /most/ people anything more than 2kW (so 240V/10A) is more than enough to charge up overnight. A perk with CCS2 is the support for 3-phase power delivery. With very simple wiring and some smart(-ish) electronics you can opportunistically deliver around 11kW to a single car, or divide it with other house appliances or other cars. It's fairly common with 400V TN-system in some parts of Europe, which makes the support of 3-phase in CCS2 very handy.

claar 3y ago
Just a nit pick: 10A @ 240V isn't enough to charge my Tesla Model Y overnight from empty - but 30A @ 240V (7.2kW) is.
- vegardx 3y ago
  Most people don't drive 500km per day, the average is closer to 50 or so. So on average, you could easily top of your battery pack on 240V/10A circuit. That would be around 10kWh, which you'll do in 5 hours. Double the average and you'll still be topped up next morning.
  - TexanFeller 3y ago
    Many people often travel regularly, like I do to visit family 150mi away. It would sure be nice to be able to charge while I'm at their house at a rate that would fill me back up. Range and charging speed matters, y'all shouldn't be just hand waving it away.
    - vegardx 3y ago
      It's not being hand waved away. You're just constructing scenarios that most people owning an electric vehicle will agree is such a non-issue that it's not really worth debating. There are plenty of fast chargers to fill the gaps. Many people travel regularly. Many people don't. That's how we ended up on the average being 50km.
      - TexanFeller 3y ago
        > There are plenty of fast chargers to fill the gaps. Definitely not on the route to where my family lives. I checked last year when I was looking at EV, there's like a single L2 charger at a hotel on the whole route. I expect it will be several more years before the millions of us with family in the country can reasonably buy an EV.
        vegardx 3y ago
        I don't think I've ever claimed that EVs are suitable for everyone right now or that the infrastructure is there to fully replace every single scenario. The point is still that most people can have most of their needs met by a simple wall plug for charging. Chances are that you don't even need to charge on your 150 miles trip. Most modern BEVs will be able to take you anywhere from 300-350 miles on a single charge. In your scenario you could literally do a round trip and have a comfortable level of charge when you get home again.
wilg 3y ago
I don't think most NA superchargers have batteries either, though some definitely do, but I believe going forward they are likely to have "powerpacks" to support pickup and semi truck charging.

bombcar 3y ago

It could also be useful at homes to regulate power (assuming the grid connections/solar/batteries were all available), allowing you to charge faster when power is cheap, and pull way back (or even backfeed) when power is expensive. But it's mainly to try to get EV fillups to be gas-station like. If you can recharge a Tesla to 80% in 5 minutes, you've won.