We routinely use SCs in CT where the rate is normally 28 cents for the initial minutes of charging. Today we used the Tesla 150 kW Supercharger in Waterbury CT and it charged 31 cents per minute. Have the rates gone up around the country?
Supercharger Recent Rate Increase?
- Thread starter BeeBee
- Start date
Glade_EV
Member
I passed through Alabama yesterday. Sometime in the last month they changed from charging by the minute to by-kWh; and the kWh rate is quite a bit higher than the regional electricity cost, -I paid about double from my previous trip.
I haven’t paid that way yet. I’ve only had the car since March. So the only 2 states where I’ve used Superchargers it was by the minute. Rates here can range from 15 cents to 30 cents per kWh. I did I the math once comparing 20 cents per kWh to 28 cents per minute and it was almost even. Of course it depends on the state of charge, whether the battery was preconditioned and the speed at which it charges. Glad I charge at home most of the time where I get an off-peak rate of 11 cents per kWh.
Those rates are a bit higher because Tesla has to pay demand charges to utilities on top of the cost per kWh charge that they pay. Demand charges are not cheap and add up especially considering how much demand even a couple of V2 chargers can pull. I’m sure a typical supercharger site electric account racks up a few thousand dollars per month in demand charges alone.
So are you saying there is more demand now so that’s why they raised the rate from 28 cents to 31 cents per minute? I bought my car in March during peek COVID and was always the only car using the SC (very low demand). So because there’s more demand now they pass on the higher cost?
No. "Demand Charges" are a type of charge that's usually only found in commercial and industrial electricity rates. It's a charge based on the maximum electricity draw in kW during a billing cycle. It's generally not on residential bills. So, if you've never seen them before, it's not that surprising. I think @tij664 's point was that you can't directly compare a residential electricity rate with a commercial rate on a purely $/kWh basis because Tesla's electricity bills aren't structured the same way as the area residential ones. But I don't think this was what you were talking about when you were saying that you compared charges before, I think they just misread your original comment.
