Thoughts on the Supercharger team reduction from a contractor (link)

[CobaltLights]

This showed up in my YT feed and is fascinating viewing. The channel belongs to a contracting firm that does Supercharger and Destination Charger installs. The speaker relates their experience amidst the Tesla reduction and what his firm will—and will not—do going forward. He also has insights into why Tesla probably made these eliminations and shares anecdotes about inefficiencies and indecision at Tesla that might have prompted the elimination.

TLDR: This contracting firm will complete new installs in which shovels hit the ground, but stop projects that were still in planning unless the site itself (e.g., Buc-ee’s, shopping center, etc.) takes on the cost in place of Tesla. Going forward, they will happily install Tesla charging hardware if a prospective site takes on the cost.

 

[DigitalStorm]

He's not wrong that it takes Tesla like 9+ months to build out a site. Pretty sure it takes less time to put in a Gas Station.

 

[Soul Surfer]

This showed up in my YT feed and is fascinating viewing. The channel belongs to a contracting firm that does Supercharger and Destination Charger installs. The speaker relates their experience amidst the Tesla reduction and what his firm will—and will not—do going forward. He also has insights into why Tesla probably made these eliminations and shares anecdotes about inefficiencies and indecision at Tesla that might have prompted the elimination.

TLDR: This contracting firm will complete new installs in which shovels hit the ground, but stop projects that were still in planning unless the site itself (e.g., Buc-ee’s, shopping center, etc.) takes on the cost in place of Tesla. Going forward, they will happily install Tesla charging hardware if a prospective site takes on the cost.

Thank you for that. While I get it, I think Musk could have cleaned up the process and kept it in-house. Some of his decisions really make us wonder if he is still the right guy for the job. Just my 2¢.

 

[Sophias_dad]

Pretty sure it takes less time to put in a Gas Station.

Can't really blame tesla for a bunch of that. A gas station needs no more power than a standard home. A bank of 8 superchargers, even the 150kw variety, is more like installing a small subdivision. Each pair capable of 150kw continuous is roughly equivalent to three 200A equipped homes, so that's about 12 full on homes, and unless its being installed at an industrial or big commercial site the electric company will probably need to design and install some new heavy high voltage three phase feeder lines.

 

[Bikeman]

... Some of his decisions really make us wonder if he is still the right guy for the job. Just my 2¢.

I don't wonder.

 

[headcase]

Wow. Very insightful.

 

[Mengy]

Really good video, very informative.

 

[SourJellybeans]

I think it's funny that this guy keeps referring to Tesla handing off to the "private sector" like Tesla isn't private sector itself.

But I think he has a point there about Tesla no longer needing to be the be-all, end-all for DCFC. I don't think he mentions it but if you look to Norway for example, Tesla is one of many DCFC options there now. Teslas are on the CCS2 standard there, and so all the EVs can use each others' charging stations, and with the adoption of NACS in North America, we're moving toward that as well - eventually all EVs in the US will be on NACS, which means all the new charging stations will have plenty of NACS connectors, which means Teslas will have access to those without adaptors.

There's certainly the possibility that there's latency between the Supercharger network opening to other EVs and other charging networks building up to capacity. It may even be a couple of years before supply can catch up with demand, but I think Tesla sees the writing on the wall and is bailing out early rather than building up supply that will eventually go without demand.

That said, the way it was done here sucks. They should have either shifted people to other parts of the company or gave them some head's up and runway to find a new job.

 

[mborkow]

eventually all EVs in the US will be on NACS

That was certainly the path we appeared to be on…but I wonder if some car companies are reconsidering.

 

[Seattle]

@SourJellybeans: tesla doen't have to be the beall/end-all for dcfc, also eventually all chargers will be nacs
@mborkow: maybe they'll be nacs

What changed so that non-tesla dc fast charger sites will now be well run, fixed, reliable that wasn't available to them before? Nothing - now there is less pressure bc tesla's well run service won't be a forcing example.

This could well sabotage nacs as the future single plug choice. Remember, the big deal was tesla's great service, the nacs plug itself hardly matters.

 

[Tom_JS]

He's not wrong that it takes Tesla like 9+ months to build out a site. Pretty sure it takes less time to put in a Gas Station.

On the power side yes absolutely. But gas stations require a lot of additional things chargers don’t. Environmental permits for large underground gas tanks, remediation support for fuel spills, fire suppression systems, and this goes on. 9+ months for a Gas station seems on the low end to me.

 

[elrobrex]

That was certainly the path we appeared to be on…but I wonder if some car companies are reconsidering.

I don't post much, but as a former big-three employee with plenty of friends and colleagues at other car companies, I can assure you that meetings and discussions are taking place in which that's been mentioned as a going-forward strategy.

 

[Patrick66]

I kind of disagree with almost everything said in the video. For Tesla to really address the next level of needs they need a dramatically different approach to the infrastructure and the utilities. They basically need to be able to work with utilities to screen locations where they can get ~2-4MW, medium voltage feeds and be responsible for everything downstream.

Watching the installation work proceed at the Austin EOL site from drone footage was disappointing. In a best-case scenario for them it took over 2 months to deploy 64 stalls, including significant re-work. The previous installation of 16 superchargers was roughly comparable on timeline, but much less re-work. (Some things are really a function of the overall installation rather than the number of pedestals.)

Maybe Tesla does want out of the Supercharger Construction business, but it seems more likely to me that they want to pause the process for a few months and refine the approach, and that makes it a good candidate for layoffs. Time will (hopefully) tell.

 

[mborkow]

I don't post much, but as a former big-three employee with plenty of friends and colleagues at other car companies, I can assure you that meetings and discussions are taking place in which that's been mentioned as a going-forward strategy.

I assume those discussions are also taking place…how could they not be? The landscape into which they thought they were deploying has been altered radically; they need to at least consider how to move forward under these new conditions.

 

[Unclepaul]

I imagine that Elon must have seen something going on with Supercharger roll outs that caused this drastic action. I see lots of newer locations that make me scratch my head. New chargers going in, close by other locations that are not that busy. Very large stations going up in the middle of no-where. Maybe he wants a more data driven rollout, instead of placing them willy-nilly.

 

[mborkow]

I imagine that Elon must have seen something going on with Supercharger roll outs that caused this drastic action. I see lots of newer locations that make me scratch my head. New chargers going in, close by other locations that are not that busy. Very large stations going up in the middle of no-where. Maybe he wants a more data driven rollout, instead of placing them willy-nilly.

Or maybe he’s just taken one ketamine hit too many?

 

[RTPEV]

He's not wrong that it takes Tesla like 9+ months to build out a site. Pretty sure it takes less time to put in a Gas Station.

I think he is partly wrong. Some installs go REALLY quickly. Of course only insiders will know how much planning goes into the process, but at this point I think Tesla mostly has things down to a science. The requirements from site to site are going to be pretty much the same (other than mega-sites maybe); they are now familiar with building code across the country, have a great network of contractors and contacts within the various localities' permitting departments; they probably have heard every question/concern those organizations have and have answers to them; and have established relationships with utilities and providers of electrical equipment. Most importantly they have a finely tuned logistics and project management operation that makes sure that everything comes together on time so you don't wind up deploying equipment to a site that won't see a transformer installed for maybe a year. It certainly wasn't always this smooth, and occasionally you get a problem child, but after you've done something thousands of times, you get pretty good at it.

It's a huge shame that that expertise and knowledge base will now be gone. I really hope that that team finds their way to the likes of Electrify America, EVgo, and ChargePoint so it's not completely lost.