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When it started taking 30 minutes to "fill up" your car. High speed chargers can cost >$200k installed. A gas pump costs about $25k installed. If the average

When it started taking 30 minutes to "fill up" your car. High speed chargers can cost >$200k installed. A gas pump costs about $25k installed. If the average person spends 4 minutes at a pump, that comes out to: The time value of a slot at a super charger can be >$5 for each charge. The time value of a slot at a gas pump is ~$0.07 per fill up. The economics of a charging business are awful. High CapEx, few cars, not many of them need chargers since they can charge at home. The economics of a gas station were not terrible. There's a reason you don't see immigrants from all over the world coming to the US to open charging stations the way you saw them opening gas stations. And that's the reason you have charging monopolies.

VectorLock 2y ago
>High speed chargers can cost >$200k installed. >A gas pump costs about $25k installed. These numbers seem skewed to me. I think you're quoting prices for gas pumps with just the pump, not any storage infrastructure like underground tanks, stores, employees. Then you're quoting the cost high speed chargers without any kind of electrical infrastructure to support them, which would be expensive, but more analogous to including the cost of all the other infrastructure for gas stations as well.
- zdragnar 2y ago
  Storage tanks are (relatively) cheap. Stores and employees are needed because margins on gasoline are extremely thin, and it's an easy way to make money if you're already putting in the pumps. The infrastructure for high speed chargers is a lot of metal, which unlike a store, does not contribute extra money in addition to the pump.
  - NotSammyHagar 2y ago
    Since fast DC charging takes more time, there's a lot more time for a person to buy something from the store.
    - zdragnar 2y ago
      Gas stations depend on cycling people through quickly during rush hour. A half dozen people sitting around for half an hour at a time won't spend enough to make up the difference in volume of traffic a normal station gets, and they don't typically devote space for lounges or other amenities unless they're nice long haul truck stops.
      - averageRoyalty 2y ago
        The model doesn't have to be like for like though. Set up a restaurant instead of a convenience store (think American diner style) and offer a discount on your charge for every $10 spent, or a similar integration. Now you have a reason for someone to sit and spend money, and likely enough as EVs hit critical mass to justify costs. There are things to work out on speed of food vs charging times, potentially a queue and valet setup - but napkin maths it seems viable.
  - VectorLock 2y ago
    Tanks are cheap. Land for them, and digging, are not. Employees are needed because most places require gas stations to be manned. Unless you're talking Bucee's they're not making much from selling a few drinks, they're just making marginal use of the building.
    - zdragnar 2y ago
      Gas stations make very little money from selling gas. The vast majority of their profits come from the building itself, to the point that if they only sold gas, they wouldn't be able to operate in most cities.
toast0 2y ago
I would think that given the chargers are so expensive, they'd want to make them easy to pay to use. I have a PHEV, so using a charger out and about is silly, but I've only managed to use one pay charger, and it was a lot harder than a gas pump. Even the free ones are hard to use. With the PHEV, the charged amounts are rather low, so I understand the desire to push stored value accounts, but really there should have been colaboration and portability, and at least chargers should have clear information on how to make them start. Go to some website and here's my name on the website. I've seen some that do, but many that don't. Gas pumps aren't always easy either. I've had several cars where you have to hold it right or the pump stops, but I've never had much trouble giving them money. Also had fun when VW sent out anti-misfueling inserts for my TDI and I got to learn which diesel pumps had unleaded gasoline sized nozzles and which had leaded gasoline sized nozzles; before the insert, the car would take either, after only the leaded fuel size.
- MrHamburger 2y ago
  Charging via application brings unnecessary friction and severely degrades UX. Another UX offenders are QR codes on charging stalls and locking charging cables unless you will find that correct QR code so you can unlock your charging cable. Not that one, that will unlock charging cable in the stall next to you. For FFS why do I need to search for QR codes at a first place... I can imagine a simple solution - take a cable, connect it to the car and start changing by tapping a contactless credit card reader next to your cable. But I never saw simple solutions, seems like every provider wants to torture its customers with half assed applications.
  - kraftman 2y ago
    You can do this in france. Tap once to open the hatch for the port, tap when you're done to pay for what you've used.
  - ggreer 2y ago
    You don't even need the contactless credit card reader. ISO 15118 is the standard for plug and charge.[1] Tesla implements it, as do most other EV manufacturers. The problem is that charging networks and manufacturers haven't settled on a way to exchange and update certificates.[2] 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_15118 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_15118 2. https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/4/24312002/ev-plug-and-charge-universal-protocol-sae-pki-roaming https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/4/24312002/ev-plug-and-char...
NotSammyHagar 2y ago
Add on to that that many gas stations make more money from going in and buying something in the store. If you stay at an EV charging station for longer, you are going to be more likely to buy something. This is a reason there are Tesla superchargers now at places like sonic in the west. Also see Buckees.
- encoderer 2y ago
  I imagine battery technology improving fast enough that it stays economically challenging to build out charging to anything like gas station level scale. We will come to think of stopping to fill up your car routinely as quaint as lamp lighters.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
dpierce9 2y ago
This doesn’t seem right to me. Is this 200k per dispenser? The dispenser is really just a fancy switch and a plug in a kiosk. If you are talking about the central transformer/switching systems, then yes that makes sense. But you can add a lot of dispensers to that. A pump is only 25k to install if you don’t include the infrastructure to support the pump (tank, canopy, fire suppression, filters, etc).all that costs more than 200k. Let’s say 25k is the marginal cost for an extra pump. What is the marginal cost for an extra dispenser?
- bangaladore 2y ago
  Exactly. I would be surprised if frankly Tesla's cost to open a decent supercharging station (6-10 stalls or something) is greater than the cost to open a 4 stall gas station.
- Kirby64 2y ago
  DCFCs are much more than a “fancy switch”. It’s a circuit capable of converting 3-phase high voltage AC into variable high voltage DC at 150-350kW. The power electronics are very, very expensive. As far as I’m aware, the large transformer you see usually hidden somewhere nearby is not the primary cost (although it is expensive, especially for very high wattage ones). And yes, it’s 200k per dispenser including the infrastructure. It doesn’t scale as well as you think it does. I think Tesla has been quoted as around 50k per dispenser including infra though, so some of it is just poor efficiency in costs by other mfgs.
  - dpierce9 2y ago
    The fast charger is the expensive part, the dispenser is not nearly so. Just like a gas station, dispensers to chargers are many-one. I was being a bit glib when I said the dispenser is a fancy switch (esp if the lines are cooled) but only just a bit. I see a report that has Tesla’s cost as 43k per installed dispenser. That is a fully load cost, not the marginal cost of dispenser but it is good enough. Looking at listings for gas stations for sale (with a convenience store but no auto repair), I see about 150-300k per dispenser. That isn’t exactly apples to apples but suffice to say it isn’t exactly cheap and much closer to representing the cost than the cost of a pump (which is I assume cheaper than a dispenser).
VyseofArcadia 2y ago
> The time value of a slot at a gas pump is ~$0.07 per fill up I think charging stations have an asset that you have neglected to consider: a captive audience. Yeah, there will always be people who plug in their car and then scroll for half an hour. But there are also people who would be interested in grabbing a bite to eat, walking around, spending money on something dumb, etc. Having a charging station be a place that you can spend money on human amenities in addition to charging improves the economics. But instead our charging stations are like, three plugs in the back of a hotel parking lot.
- onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
  > But instead our charging stations are like, three plugs in the back of a hotel parking lot. It's almost as if there's an economic reason for that.
  - triceratops 2y ago
    Maybe it's a chicken-and-egg situation that needs a tipping point. If there's enough EVs on the road it becomes profitable.
ggreer 2y ago
Companies tend not to publish their costs, but we can find some info about the economics of charging stations. A grant program in Texas subsidized up to 70% of the cost of charging stations. Tesla bid $500k for a fast charging station with 17 plugs, and around $380k for a station with 9 plugs.[1] That's $29k per plug for the 17 charger station. Assuming they asked for the maximum subsidy, that means Tesla's costs are around $41k per plug. If Tesla bills customers 20 cents per kWh above market electricity rates, they'll make back the cost of the plug after 205,000kWh. A typical EV has a 70-100kWh battery, so that's 2,000-3,000 full charges. If it takes an hour to fully charge a car, then each plug will be profitable after 2-4 months assuming a 100% duty cycle. Actual duty cycles are much lower. If we assume the charger is active 15% of the time, then it will be profitable after 18-30 months. Again, these are all rather pessimistic estimates. Actual markups and duty cycles are higher, and actual charging times are shorter. If we assume a 20% duty cycle, 45 minute charging time, and a 30 cent per kWh markup, it only takes 8-10 months to become profitable. I didn't include maintenance costs, but those are much lower than gas stations because charging stations require no full time staff. 1. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2022/04/14/teslas-texas-charger-grant-applications-fail-its-bad-for-texas-but-reveals-teslas-super-low-costs/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2022/04/14/teslas...
- no_wizard 2y ago
  EV manufacturers (re: most car manufactures) are going to do all they can to get the government to subsidize this as much as possible. I noticed an explosion of EV charging stations where I live after the state government put incentives in to subsidize their build out. Other states have done it already and are doing it now. They're going to see the pattern of "I can get the government to subsidize this" and will hold out for them going forward, is my best guess.
  - ggreer 2y ago
    It's important to distinguish Tesla from other companies. The others haven't figured out how to make chargers cheaply yet, so they're forced to ask for subsidies. That's why Tesla's bids on that Texas contract were so much lower than the competition. Tesla mass produces their charging stations in factories. Entire stations are assembled from modular units, mounted on a concrete slab, and shipped to the installation site on a flatbed.[1] These optimizations have gotten installation times down to 4 days.[2] Sources inside of Tesla have claimed their charging network is profitable, which is impressive considering that until recently, their network got no subsidies because it only supported charging Teslas. 1. https://x.com/Tesla/status/1636085524694695939 https://x.com/Tesla/status/1636085524694695939 2. https://x.com/TeslaCharging/status/1777395990766432596 https://x.com/TeslaCharging/status/1777395990766432596
cogman10 2y ago
> The economics of a charging business are awful. Ish. I mean one thing the charging business has going for it is that after the initial investment the ongoing investment is basically 0. You don't have weekly fuel shipments or any real ongoing maintenance costs. You also don't see immigrants all over charging stations because they are mostly unmanned. Usually placed in parking lots of retail stores.
- MrHamburger 2y ago
  > I mean one thing the charging business has going for it is that after the initial investment the ongoing investment is basically 0 That's not actually correct. You need to pay for reserved power in the grid, which can be significant amount regardless if you are using that power or not. So installing big DCFC charger where nobody is going to use it will eat you up on fees for reserved power.
  - cogman10 2y ago
    Any insights to what the reserved rates are? Nothing really came up on google. I could find some commercial power rates which tended to be lower than residential rates, but I assumed that's not accurate since these things will eat a lot more power than most businesses would.
- beAbU 2y ago
  > You also don't see immigrants all over charging stations because they are mostly unmanned. Usually placed in parking lots of retail stores tf is this supposed to mean
  - cogman10 2y ago
    Mostly just responding to the OP > There's a reason you don't see immigrants from all over the world coming to the US to open charging stations the way you saw them opening gas stations. My guess is what they meant by this is the very visible minimarts on gas stations often manned by (presumed) immigrants.
ipdashc 2y ago
> There's a reason you don't see immigrants from all over the world coming to the US to open charging stations the way you saw them opening gas stations. As the other commenter said, AFAIK, the majority of a gas station's income comes from the convenience store, no? Profit margins on gas are really low - Google says it's around 2%.
- bobthepanda 2y ago
  I imagine there are additional factors. * many prime charging station locations are where the gas stations currently are. The high installation costs and long charging times mean you’d lose money swapping them 1:1 right now, and most gas stations are already optimized to hold the max pumps per spot of land. * it is challenging to find new locations not least because cities have found out that gas stations are pretty problematic uses of land when it comes to neighborhood desirability, traffic, etc. so many are loth to approve new charging locations.
  - dylan604 2y ago
    The cons of a gas station in the neighborhood are when it's a convenient store with pumps. The sale of lotto, beer, smokes, and low cost food attract it's own crowd that the NIMBYs do not like. Switch that to a storeless unmanned set of pumps, and all of that goes away. I've seen a few of these types of locations around town. Just an awning with a few pumps under it. That's pretty much what all of the electric charge locations look like. Just "rent" spots at existing places on the highway with parking nearest the main road (which is typically the least desired spots in the lot). Pretty much any hotel would be a good candidate.
    - bobthepanda 2y ago
      Eh there are a ton of other downsides. By their nature, high-throughput charging stations with lots of curb cuts are bad for walkability, eyes on the street, etc. that people want in their neighborhoods. For example many cities now ban new drive throughs. And the convenience stores are the thing that makes the money at gas stations.
osrec 2y ago
A gas pump relies on a significantly larger chain of infrastructure though. We just accept that it's quicker because it's already in place. No one factors in the time at the refinery etc etc. Energy delivered in the from electricity isn't that bad or slow when you compare it fully, including the generation infrastructure. I personally think we will move towards swappable pre-charged batteries at charging stations, which will drop the "refuel" time to something comparable to (or less than) petrol.
shepherdjerred 2y ago
> High speed chargers can cost >$200k installed. Should this go down as chargers become more popular due to economies of scale? Or will they always be significantly more expensive than gas pumps?

VectorLock 2y ago

>High speed chargers can cost >$200k installed. >A gas pump costs about $25k installed. These numbers seem skewed to me. I think you're quoting prices for gas pumps with just the pump, not any storage infrastructure like underground tanks, stores, employees. Then you're quoting the cost high speed chargers without any kind of electrical infrastructure to support them, which would be expensive, but more analogous to including the cost of all the other infrastructure for gas stations as well.

zdragnar 2y ago
Storage tanks are (relatively) cheap. Stores and employees are needed because margins on gasoline are extremely thin, and it's an easy way to make money if you're already putting in the pumps. The infrastructure for high speed chargers is a lot of metal, which unlike a store, does not contribute extra money in addition to the pump.
- NotSammyHagar 2y ago
  Since fast DC charging takes more time, there's a lot more time for a person to buy something from the store.
  - zdragnar 2y ago
    Gas stations depend on cycling people through quickly during rush hour. A half dozen people sitting around for half an hour at a time won't spend enough to make up the difference in volume of traffic a normal station gets, and they don't typically devote space for lounges or other amenities unless they're nice long haul truck stops.
    - averageRoyalty 2y ago
      The model doesn't have to be like for like though. Set up a restaurant instead of a convenience store (think American diner style) and offer a discount on your charge for every $10 spent, or a similar integration. Now you have a reason for someone to sit and spend money, and likely enough as EVs hit critical mass to justify costs. There are things to work out on speed of food vs charging times, potentially a queue and valet setup - but napkin maths it seems viable.
- VectorLock 2y ago
  Tanks are cheap. Land for them, and digging, are not. Employees are needed because most places require gas stations to be manned. Unless you're talking Bucee's they're not making much from selling a few drinks, they're just making marginal use of the building.
  - zdragnar 2y ago
    Gas stations make very little money from selling gas. The vast majority of their profits come from the building itself, to the point that if they only sold gas, they wouldn't be able to operate in most cities.

toast0 2y ago

I would think that given the chargers are so expensive, they'd want to make them easy to pay to use. I have a PHEV, so using a charger out and about is silly, but I've only managed to use one pay charger, and it was a lot harder than a gas pump. Even the free ones are hard to use. With the PHEV, the charged amounts are rather low, so I understand the desire to push stored value accounts, but really there should have been colaboration and portability, and at least chargers should have clear information on how to make them start. Go to some website and here's my name on the website. I've seen some that do, but many that don't. Gas pumps aren't always easy either. I've had several cars where you have to hold it right or the pump stops, but I've never had much trouble giving them money. Also had fun when VW sent out anti-misfueling inserts for my TDI and I got to learn which diesel pumps had unleaded gasoline sized nozzles and which had leaded gasoline sized nozzles; before the insert, the car would take either, after only the leaded fuel size.

MrHamburger 2y ago
Charging via application brings unnecessary friction and severely degrades UX. Another UX offenders are QR codes on charging stalls and locking charging cables unless you will find that correct QR code so you can unlock your charging cable. Not that one, that will unlock charging cable in the stall next to you. For FFS why do I need to search for QR codes at a first place... I can imagine a simple solution - take a cable, connect it to the car and start changing by tapping a contactless credit card reader next to your cable. But I never saw simple solutions, seems like every provider wants to torture its customers with half assed applications.
- kraftman 2y ago
  You can do this in france. Tap once to open the hatch for the port, tap when you're done to pay for what you've used.
- ggreer 2y ago
  You don't even need the contactless credit card reader. ISO 15118 is the standard for plug and charge.[1] Tesla implements it, as do most other EV manufacturers. The problem is that charging networks and manufacturers haven't settled on a way to exchange and update certificates.[2] 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_15118 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_15118 2. https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/4/24312002/ev-plug-and-charge-universal-protocol-sae-pki-roaming https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/4/24312002/ev-plug-and-char...

NotSammyHagar 2y ago

Add on to that that many gas stations make more money from going in and buying something in the store. If you stay at an EV charging station for longer, you are going to be more likely to buy something. This is a reason there are Tesla superchargers now at places like sonic in the west. Also see Buckees.

encoderer 2y ago
I imagine battery technology improving fast enough that it stays economically challenging to build out charging to anything like gas station level scale. We will come to think of stopping to fill up your car routinely as quaint as lamp lighters.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

dpierce9 2y ago

This doesn’t seem right to me. Is this 200k per dispenser? The dispenser is really just a fancy switch and a plug in a kiosk. If you are talking about the central transformer/switching systems, then yes that makes sense. But you can add a lot of dispensers to that. A pump is only 25k to install if you don’t include the infrastructure to support the pump (tank, canopy, fire suppression, filters, etc).all that costs more than 200k. Let’s say 25k is the marginal cost for an extra pump. What is the marginal cost for an extra dispenser?

bangaladore 2y ago
Exactly. I would be surprised if frankly Tesla's cost to open a decent supercharging station (6-10 stalls or something) is greater than the cost to open a 4 stall gas station.
Kirby64 2y ago
DCFCs are much more than a “fancy switch”. It’s a circuit capable of converting 3-phase high voltage AC into variable high voltage DC at 150-350kW. The power electronics are very, very expensive. As far as I’m aware, the large transformer you see usually hidden somewhere nearby is not the primary cost (although it is expensive, especially for very high wattage ones). And yes, it’s 200k per dispenser including the infrastructure. It doesn’t scale as well as you think it does. I think Tesla has been quoted as around 50k per dispenser including infra though, so some of it is just poor efficiency in costs by other mfgs.
- dpierce9 2y ago
  The fast charger is the expensive part, the dispenser is not nearly so. Just like a gas station, dispensers to chargers are many-one. I was being a bit glib when I said the dispenser is a fancy switch (esp if the lines are cooled) but only just a bit. I see a report that has Tesla’s cost as 43k per installed dispenser. That is a fully load cost, not the marginal cost of dispenser but it is good enough. Looking at listings for gas stations for sale (with a convenience store but no auto repair), I see about 150-300k per dispenser. That isn’t exactly apples to apples but suffice to say it isn’t exactly cheap and much closer to representing the cost than the cost of a pump (which is I assume cheaper than a dispenser).

VyseofArcadia 2y ago

> The time value of a slot at a gas pump is ~$0.07 per fill up I think charging stations have an asset that you have neglected to consider: a captive audience. Yeah, there will always be people who plug in their car and then scroll for half an hour. But there are also people who would be interested in grabbing a bite to eat, walking around, spending money on something dumb, etc. Having a charging station be a place that you can spend money on human amenities in addition to charging improves the economics. But instead our charging stations are like, three plugs in the back of a hotel parking lot.

onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
> But instead our charging stations are like, three plugs in the back of a hotel parking lot. It's almost as if there's an economic reason for that.
- triceratops 2y ago
  Maybe it's a chicken-and-egg situation that needs a tipping point. If there's enough EVs on the road it becomes profitable.

ggreer 2y ago

Companies tend not to publish their costs, but we can find some info about the economics of charging stations. A grant program in Texas subsidized up to 70% of the cost of charging stations. Tesla bid $500k for a fast charging station with 17 plugs, and around $380k for a station with 9 plugs.[1] That's $29k per plug for the 17 charger station. Assuming they asked for the maximum subsidy, that means Tesla's costs are around $41k per plug. If Tesla bills customers 20 cents per kWh above market electricity rates, they'll make back the cost of the plug after 205,000kWh. A typical EV has a 70-100kWh battery, so that's 2,000-3,000 full charges. If it takes an hour to fully charge a car, then each plug will be profitable after 2-4 months assuming a 100% duty cycle. Actual duty cycles are much lower. If we assume the charger is active 15% of the time, then it will be profitable after 18-30 months. Again, these are all rather pessimistic estimates. Actual markups and duty cycles are higher, and actual charging times are shorter. If we assume a 20% duty cycle, 45 minute charging time, and a 30 cent per kWh markup, it only takes 8-10 months to become profitable. I didn't include maintenance costs, but those are much lower than gas stations because charging stations require no full time staff. 1. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2022/04/14/teslas-texas-charger-grant-applications-fail-its-bad-for-texas-but-reveals-teslas-super-low-costs/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2022/04/14/teslas...

no_wizard 2y ago
EV manufacturers (re: most car manufactures) are going to do all they can to get the government to subsidize this as much as possible. I noticed an explosion of EV charging stations where I live after the state government put incentives in to subsidize their build out. Other states have done it already and are doing it now. They're going to see the pattern of "I can get the government to subsidize this" and will hold out for them going forward, is my best guess.
- ggreer 2y ago
  It's important to distinguish Tesla from other companies. The others haven't figured out how to make chargers cheaply yet, so they're forced to ask for subsidies. That's why Tesla's bids on that Texas contract were so much lower than the competition. Tesla mass produces their charging stations in factories. Entire stations are assembled from modular units, mounted on a concrete slab, and shipped to the installation site on a flatbed.[1] These optimizations have gotten installation times down to 4 days.[2] Sources inside of Tesla have claimed their charging network is profitable, which is impressive considering that until recently, their network got no subsidies because it only supported charging Teslas. 1. https://x.com/Tesla/status/1636085524694695939 https://x.com/Tesla/status/1636085524694695939 2. https://x.com/TeslaCharging/status/1777395990766432596 https://x.com/TeslaCharging/status/1777395990766432596

cogman10 2y ago

> The economics of a charging business are awful. Ish. I mean one thing the charging business has going for it is that after the initial investment the ongoing investment is basically 0. You don't have weekly fuel shipments or any real ongoing maintenance costs. You also don't see immigrants all over charging stations because they are mostly unmanned. Usually placed in parking lots of retail stores.

MrHamburger 2y ago
> I mean one thing the charging business has going for it is that after the initial investment the ongoing investment is basically 0 That's not actually correct. You need to pay for reserved power in the grid, which can be significant amount regardless if you are using that power or not. So installing big DCFC charger where nobody is going to use it will eat you up on fees for reserved power.
- cogman10 2y ago
  Any insights to what the reserved rates are? Nothing really came up on google. I could find some commercial power rates which tended to be lower than residential rates, but I assumed that's not accurate since these things will eat a lot more power than most businesses would.
beAbU 2y ago
> You also don't see immigrants all over charging stations because they are mostly unmanned. Usually placed in parking lots of retail stores tf is this supposed to mean
- cogman10 2y ago
  Mostly just responding to the OP > There's a reason you don't see immigrants from all over the world coming to the US to open charging stations the way you saw them opening gas stations. My guess is what they meant by this is the very visible minimarts on gas stations often manned by (presumed) immigrants.

ipdashc 2y ago

> There's a reason you don't see immigrants from all over the world coming to the US to open charging stations the way you saw them opening gas stations. As the other commenter said, AFAIK, the majority of a gas station's income comes from the convenience store, no? Profit margins on gas are really low - Google says it's around 2%.

bobthepanda 2y ago
I imagine there are additional factors. * many prime charging station locations are where the gas stations currently are. The high installation costs and long charging times mean you’d lose money swapping them 1:1 right now, and most gas stations are already optimized to hold the max pumps per spot of land. * it is challenging to find new locations not least because cities have found out that gas stations are pretty problematic uses of land when it comes to neighborhood desirability, traffic, etc. so many are loth to approve new charging locations.
- dylan604 2y ago
  The cons of a gas station in the neighborhood are when it's a convenient store with pumps. The sale of lotto, beer, smokes, and low cost food attract it's own crowd that the NIMBYs do not like. Switch that to a storeless unmanned set of pumps, and all of that goes away. I've seen a few of these types of locations around town. Just an awning with a few pumps under it. That's pretty much what all of the electric charge locations look like. Just "rent" spots at existing places on the highway with parking nearest the main road (which is typically the least desired spots in the lot). Pretty much any hotel would be a good candidate.
  - bobthepanda 2y ago
    Eh there are a ton of other downsides. By their nature, high-throughput charging stations with lots of curb cuts are bad for walkability, eyes on the street, etc. that people want in their neighborhoods. For example many cities now ban new drive throughs. And the convenience stores are the thing that makes the money at gas stations.

osrec 2y ago

A gas pump relies on a significantly larger chain of infrastructure though. We just accept that it's quicker because it's already in place. No one factors in the time at the refinery etc etc. Energy delivered in the from electricity isn't that bad or slow when you compare it fully, including the generation infrastructure. I personally think we will move towards swappable pre-charged batteries at charging stations, which will drop the "refuel" time to something comparable to (or less than) petrol.

shepherdjerred 2y ago

> High speed chargers can cost >$200k installed. Should this go down as chargers become more popular due to economies of scale? Or will they always be significantly more expensive than gas pumps?