Hi! I'm sorry for the newb question; I didnt see a recent intuitive post when searching this forum... I transitioned from Model X with unlimited supercharging to Model 3 and just trying to understand the pay per use pricing model.
It is kind of confusing.
Tesla Support seems to show a fixed USA Tier 2 Rate of $0.28/kWh here:
Supercharging
It's not. Unfortunately that page is terrible in not explaining what that is. That is an
average across the country.
This third party Teslanomics page shows state-variable pricing:
Tableau Public
When they first made Superchargers for pay, they did make the rates different per state. And that page on Tesla's site above
used to show a drop down box with state by state what the pricing was in each one. Now, they replaced it with just averages, which is less useful.
What they actually have now, is different pricing per
each location, even within states. This can make some sense in some areas where different regions of a state have different utilities with different energy sources and pricing. These prices are not listed on the website, but they are displayed in the car when you are approaching or at a station.
And just for giggles, this Tesla page shows an assumed cost of $0.26/kWh:
Supercharger | Tesla
Well, with each site having different pricing, someone has to pick some number that is kind of an average of the averages.
Not trying to bash Tesla pricing at all! I think the business model is fair and more about the service of high speed charging... I'm just trying to understand how pay per use is billed today... Thanks!
Unfortunately, they can't be completely consistent and straightforward with this, because of annoying state laws that affect all of the charging network companies. They would like to be able to charge directly metered per kWh of energy. But there are still several states that have stupid laws that say only the electric utilities have the right to sell electricity within this state. Other private companies are not allowed to--period. So Chagepoint, Tesla, and others have to charge per minute for use of their resources, so they are getting around that forbidding of "charging for electricity".
That can make quite a difference, though, if you are paying a rate per minute, but you are getting drastically different power levels delivering different amounts of energy per minute. So Tesla has tried to make that reasonable by having a lower cost if you are at a lower power level (below 60kW) and a higher cost if you are above that 60kW. So that is what the Tier1 and Tier2 cost rates are. But they only have those in states where they have to charge per minute.
Clear as mud?
