Supercharger - Fort Stockton, Texas

[ℬête Noire]

Not sure I agree- every gas station sets it price. Every utility sets its price. Every supercharger experiences its own cost based on where it gets it power and rent. Why would the price for filling up not vary by location? Not to make a profit, but to avoid loss.

Gas stations vary by location because they have competitors across the street, and they want you to buy more from them because they turn a profit on that volume. This is their core business (well for most it's not, what their core business is the snacks/groceries, what they really want is trips to their store). Superchargers don't really have competition, and are unlikely to get any because they are pricing at cost. Tesla is also generally indifferent if you were able to charge elsewhere, because it doesn't mean less profit for them. It just means less effort for them.

They do need to maintain some regional pricing. Partially because wide variances in grid prices but also because of varying State laws and taxes. You can't even sell charging the same in most of the States between the Rockies and the Mississippi, along with some others. They have to sell (and thus price) by time connected to the SC rather than by the kWh.

 

[AZ Desert Driver]

Yer right - I forgot about the regulations about selling Elontricity. No longer a simple business model, but one skewed by gerrymandered regulations.

 

[BioSehnsucht]

Texas is apparently a "sell by time" state. Was annoying the time I decided to try Supercharging for the first time, only to realize that I was at an urban charger location (peak power ~72kw) but the price tiers are over 60kw and under 60kw for the whole state apparently... so I was paying the same price most of the time that I would at a station giving me 100+ kw, but for longer!

 

[ℬête Noire]

Texas is apparently a "sell by time" state. Was annoying the time I decided to try Supercharging for the first time, only to realize that I was at an urban charger location (peak power ~72kw) but the price tiers are over 60kw and under 60kw for the whole state apparently... so I was paying the same price most of the time that I would at a station giving me 100+ kw, but for longer!

Yes. I expect I'll be avoiding the few Urban SC we have here in TX. On the flip side when you're charging between 100kW & 115kW, and between 50kW & 60kW it's a smoking deal compared to kW pricing States.

It's the time between 80kW and 61kW, and especially the time sub-30kW that really hurts. But upside is outside of people with Free Lifetime charging, there are unlikely to be many people clogging the SCs taking their vehicle to 100%.

 

[SW2Fiddler]

what their core business is the snacks/groceries, what they really want is trips to their store

Yeah I will like it when charging stations compete for access to my watt-hole and 20-30 minutes of my immobilized time. Why there aren't business models flying around for this yet, I haven't any idea. There'll be a Mad Rush once they get a clue.

 

[rideincircles]

I was planning on taking my 14 year old Scion to Big Bend next month, but may wait until I get my 3 in soon since I am about to order it, and this should alleviate any other issues. Good timing it seems.

 

[EfficientWatts]

Yes. I expect I'll be avoiding the few Urban SC we have here in TX. On the flip side when you're charging between 100kW & 115kW, and between 50kW & 60kW it's a smoking deal compared to kW pricing States.

It's the time between 80kW and 61kW, and especially the time sub-30kW that really hurts. But upside is outside of people with Free Lifetime charging, there are unlikely to be many people clogging the SCs taking their vehicle to 100%.

I wonder how many tiers they can legally have. If they could have more than two I wonder if they would consider a middle tier (say like $0.15/min for 61kW-80kW). If they wanted to they could just limit this to urban chargers. If extended to all types, to offset this for regular superchargers they may need to up tier 1 a little bit.

 

[cpa]

Not sure I agree- every gas station sets it price. Every utility sets its price. Every supercharger experiences its own cost based on where it gets it power and rent. Why would the price for filling up not vary by location? Not to make a profit, but to avoid loss.

Perhaps--and this is just guesswork from the accounting department--it would be unusually tedious to track each Supercharger location across the United States and assign a different rate for each site that depends on the local pricing by that particular utility. It is likely that there would be several departments involved to adjust the fees whenever a local utility increased or decreased their rates. Moreover, it is easier for the public to remember that all California Superchargers are 26 cents per kWh. It makes no difference if the utility is PG&E, SCE, SDG&E, SMUD, IID, or any of the other municipal or irrigation districts that are purveyors of electricity to the public.

This does not factor in customer inquiries as to why they were charged 18 cents per unit at location Q but 20 cents at location Z in the same state. And, believe me, I worked in retail in high school and college, and there is no end to people asking why pricing was different on essentially the same items.

So, I think it is an easy concept to grasp that Tesla's fees for Supercharging will be determined on a state-wide basis, and not by discrete locations. I further believe that over the long run, it will cost Tesla less in overhead in trying to change locations individually and by tying up customer representatives to explain (and even possibly adjust) insignificant price differences between two Superchargers in the same state.

 

[Alphacrux]

Any pics today?

 

[PLUS EV]

IIRC Elon said Superchargers will not be operated as profit centers — unlike some of the other EV players, I would add.

Elon says a lot of things.

 

[XHabjab]

Elon says a lot of things.

Actually Elon says a lot of things, and i think a lot of us take him for granted. His stated long term goal is to get humans worldwide less dependant on fossil fuels. He wants to run a profitable business but is not interested in squeezing nickels and dimes out of his customers.

Imagine what any of the following would look like if GM, Ford, BMW or Porsche were in charge:

• Supercharger access
• Supercharger electricity
• Software updates
• Map/GPS updates
• Traffic aware routing
• Streaming music access
• Emergency service

Tesla gives a lot of stuff for free(*) that would be an expensive option with subscription fees with anybody else. They give customers the benefit of the doubt a lot of times.

I'm blending Elon and Tesla here but the above positives are because of Elon.

To be clear, there are negatives too but the positives win.

* after an exorbitant purchase price.

 

[PLUS EV]

Actually Elon says a lot of things, and i think a lot of us take him for granted. His stated long term goal is to get humans worldwide less dependant on fossil fuels. He wants to run a profitable business but is not interested in squeezing nickels and dimes out of his customers.

Imagine what any of the following would look like if GM, Ford, BMW or Porsche were in charge:

• Supercharger access
• Supercharger electricity
• Software updates
• Map/GPS updates
• Traffic aware routing
• Streaming music access
• Emergency service

Tesla gives a lot of stuff for free(*) that would be an expensive option with subscription fees with anybody else. They give customers the benefit of the doubt a lot of times.

I'm blending Elon and Tesla here but the above positives are because of Elon.

To be clear, there are negatives too but the positives win.

* after an exorbitant purchase price.

Okay that was a prompt and defensive response!

All I'm saying is based on their state by state fee structure there is no way they are charging customers exactly what it costs to implement supercharging. They are either charging more or less. I don't have any problem with this but the assumption that they aren't making any money off of supercharging and will never make any money off of supercharging is clearly false.

 

[Dr. J]

They are either charging more or less. I don't have any problem with this but the assumption that they aren't making or losing any money off of supercharging and will never make any money or lose any money off of supercharging is clearly false.

FTFY, but I don't get your point. Tesla says their policy is not to make money off of supercharging. Do you have any evidence they're making money off of or losing money on supercharging? Is there any reason to assume they are making/losing money off of supercharging?

 

[PLUS EV]

Is there any reason to assume they are making/losing money off of supercharging?

Well they aren't going to be breaking dead even with the clumsy state by state fees they are charging. So that leaves two other possibilities.

 

[XHabjab]

Okay that was a prompt and defensive response

Hopefully you don't think I'm arguing. I'm trying not to.

All I'm saying is based on their state by state fee structure there is no way they are charging customers exactly what it costs to implement supercharging. They are either charging more or less. I don't have any problem with this but the assumption that they aren't making any money off of supercharging and will never make any money off of supercharging is clearly false.

I don't know where the source is now but Elon said that the Superchargers would not be profit centers. He didn't say that there would never be costs to the end user. Every kWh that we get from a Supercharger costs Tesla. Capital costs are around $200k per site. There are significant maintenance costs.

If they charged us double the cost of the power, it would not pay for itself. Right now, almost all of the SC budget comes out of new car sales. That will get split out some day.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Well they aren't going to be breaking dead even with the clumsy state by state fees they are charging. So that leaves two other possibilities.

Elon Musk has said that it won't be run for profit. Easy to say because it's dumb to try when they can makes thousand per car instead of trying to accumulate lots of cents and ending up with pissed-off customers. I think they'll just run it to keep the losses small.

 

[XHabjab]

Call for relevance

This thread is supposed to be about the Supercharger installation in Fort Stockton TX. The last 40 messages or so have been about money and electricity and corporate decisions, more relevant (barely) to all Supercharger sites. Sadly, I've been part of that. My apologies.

That subject has been beaten to death in the Infrastructure and charging standards threads. Could we please shift all angles of the subject over there?

Sorry for that. I know I'm the leading offender.

 

[TaoJones]

With regard to the impending Golden Spike Event:

I expect to have golden spikes ready to go by the end of this month.

After disbursing the spikes before the ribbon cutting, presuming there is one, and driving one spike into the ground 10-15 minutes thereafter, I do like Charlie's recommended place referenced above at which to gather for proper vittles and beverage. Or beverage and vittles.

Three additional things:

1. We still need a sledgehammer - does anyone just happen to have one and not mind bringing it with?
2. If anyone would enjoy a properly-aged Cuban* cigar after or during beverages, please sound off so I can get an idea of headcount.
3. Most importantly, if anyone is coming from Arizona, Nevada, or California and is 100% certain of their attendance, then please PM me. I would like a contingency plan to ensure that the painted spikes get to FS in case new business takes me offshore in mid/late October.

* For those unaware, it is not illegal to *possess* small quantities of Cuban cigars. It is, however, in the United States, not an insignificant problem to purchase/import/sell them in any quantity whatsoever last I checked. Hey, I didn't write the applicable statutes, and if they've been updated since, well, too bad.

 

[ℬête Noire]

< XHabjab is right about keeping on-topic, suger-post retracted>

TaoJones : What if some hypothetical person traveling from the East happened to be picking up on the way a case of grape-based beverages they already had on order, and happened to have small disposable cups, and the grape-based beverage accidentally spilled in the very small cups?

 

[GroundForces]

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