Supercharger - Lowell, MA

[Tdreamer]

Lineman trucks are promising!! But with the layoffs will the SCs ever get commissioned

Salem was commissioned today much, I think, to everyone's surprise. So the clear answer is yes. Lowell still needs work from the contractor to connect where they stopped their primary trench to wherever National Grid terminates their line work on a new pole. Lots of uncertainty still there, with existing supercharger site construction projects coming to a close and a bunch ready to start without any direction from Tesla on how to proceed.

That could free up a crew to quickly finish off Lowell perhaps. We'll see.

 

[Tdreamer]

Encouraging status update on this site. The utility seems to have done most of their work to install new poles and overhead primary lines to get power near where the transformer primary conduit was run. Not sure if any further utility work is needed (other than an obvious missing transformer. I think the next step is for the contractor to return to the site and complete their primary conduit to where the pole now exists - unless the utility still needs to get another pole closer to the current termination of the conduit on the other side of dumpster enclosure.

 

[meth0d21]

That's awesome - thank you for the update!

 

[RoBo H0B0]

No obvious changes in the last week and a half on the Lowell site. Still no transformer.

 

[mianesva]

Worker. Wheelbarrow. Activity

 

[Tdreamer]

Could be the contractor has returned to the site to finish the primary conduit run to where National Grid put their poles.

 

[cmaster]

Lowell, MA would be an excellent location for new superchargers. It's intriguing why the installation process seems to be quite lengthy there.

 

[Tdreamer]

The build itself took the usual amount of time for the contractor. The issue specific to this site was the utility dragging their feet for many months on doing the work to install pole(s) to bring the power to an agreed upon site where the contractor can then tie their conduits into. The work the utility finally delivered recently was about the time when Tesla blew up the supercharger development team, and in doing so, all contacts the contractor had with Tesla to determine when/where/how to proceed on projects. Sounds like that communication line has been re-established, although how much communication is occuring there is not clear. Enough to get new jobs underway selectively it seems (Peabody, MA was given the green light to begin).

Hopefully this Lowell project is finally moving forward again to closure. It may still see a significant delay related to getting the transformer if I had to guess - anything ordered for the site would likely have been reallocated, and this project may have been bumped to the end of the list. Time will tell...

 

[mianesva]

 

[Tdreamer]

Hmmm.... is that, by chance, a transformer about to be lifted up from the street to the pad? Could be wrong - perspective in that image could just be playing tricks, and that could be work on the tower.

 

[mianesva]

Crane has nothing to do with the SC site.

 

[mianesva]

Seems they are wiring white battery containers ?

 

[Tdreamer]

Seems they are wiring white battery containers ?

White boxes are the superchargers and associated switchgear. Wiring would either be from the switchgear cabinet to the transformer pad (secondary wiring in preparation for a transformer delivery) or supercharger cabinet to the twelve supercharger posts. The later work would have the supercharger posts themselves opened/apart for the wiring. I would have thought the post wiring would have been completed a long time ago though, leaving the primary (typically but not always done by the utility) and secondary wiring outstanding.

 

[bprender25]

A different view

 

[Tdreamer]

Final answer for the day: installing / reconfiguring / wiring an ADA compliant charging post. Any progress is good progress. This site will open someday...

 

[aronth5]

Final answer for the day: installing / reconfiguring / wiring an ADA compliant charging post. Any progress is good progress. This site will open someday...

LOL, I was just going to post about this. They had a small backhoe later in the day.

 

[aronth5]

LOL, I was just going to post about this. They had a small backhoe later in the day.

FYI
Note pipe and cement work.

 

[bprender25]

a black charge station has been installed

 

[Fiver]

Black? You mean one without a cover on?

 

[bprender25]

Black? You mean one without a cover on?

lol yes sorry. I looked and took a pic. I was excited thinking it was something different.