Supercharger - Reston, VA

[Reddy Kilowatt]

Well its been a month,that thing should be on line by now.

 

[Syd]

this is PECO country, nothing happens it a month.

 

[DavidB]

this is PECO country, nothing happens it a month.

I would like to disagree with your post.

I can't, but I would like to.

 

[MXFan]

this is PECO country, nothing happens it a month.

I thought it was Dominion Energy.

 

[Syd]

My mistake, I had a lot of tabs open, I thought i was in a different one.

 

[Reddy Kilowatt]

I wanted to post these photos of the Chantilly EVGO station to bring up a point. That station has been done for a while with that massive vault sitting there in the parking lot. I don't know if there installing an underground transformer or if it will become a splice vault. The point is this is going to cost a fortune to power this site. they are going to have to run power down the parking lot then across the street to get out to 28 for power, routing around the holding pond. I guarantee this is going to cost 6 figures. They are setting up signage everywhere, this will take time and will be disruptive. I believe the Reston town center site died for this reason There was no substantial power close to the parking decks and they would have had to do the same. Secondly, the next operator such as Electrify America could sit back and wait, then step in a get a free ride on Tesla's dime when there done with the install, or vise versa. This is what I have heard through the grape vine. A similar issue that happened when the cell phone towers started appearing in the 80's. The government changed the laws forcing all the carriers to share the towers and costs.

Now if this is VW's penalty money at work I don't think it would mater. Who knows This could become a Tesla site once done?

 

[vdiv]

Still matters as the settlement money is now "our" money, we could have had more charging capacity had it been spend frugally instead of hastily to meet some arbitrary deadline objective.

 

[Tholland]

I wish that all of these different company’s would invest in using solar to help offset some of this cost as well. I know Tesla said they will eventually get to a point where they will be using solar over the charging station. That should help with cost. And with temperatures as well. I charged at Springfield yesterday and forgot how hot it can get inside the car and how that also effects charging speed as well. Sorry for the kinda off topic part. But you are right about the superchargers at town center.... there was no where close for the power and RTC didn’t want to spend that much to get the power plus all the tear up include to get the power there.

 

[mcot222]

I wish that all of these different company’s would invest in using solar to help offset some of this cost as well. I know Tesla said they will eventually get to a point where they will be using solar over the charging station. That should help with cost. And with temperatures as well. I charged at Springfield yesterday and forgot how hot it can get inside the car and how that also effects charging speed as well. Sorry for the kinda off topic part. But you are right about the superchargers at town center.... there was no where close for the power and RTC didn’t want to spend that much to get the power plus all the tear up include to get the power there.

They still need grid tie with solar so all of the infrastructure costs that Reddy mentioned are the same except they can do some peak shaving once the site is running. Solar with batteries to do peak shaving is quite expensive still. The Las Vegas High Roller site reportedly cost about 1 million. Payoff is likely years. I do get your point about shade though.

I’m not sure how you could have a totally off-grid Supercharger site. Their Megapack batteries definitely have enough power for a Supercharger site. You just need enough panels to charge the battery enough for all of the cars that would charge there during the day+night and you would have to account for cloudy days. You could also waste the solar power if you had very sunny days and not many cars and the batteries were full. Keep in mind this is likely thousands of panels so you would need a decent sized field of solar relatively close by. All of that would of course be crazy expensive compared to any grid connection.

 

[Tholland]

They still need grid tie with solar so all of the infrastructure costs that Reddy mentioned are the same except they can do some peak shaving once the site is running. Solar with batteries to do peak shaving is quite expensive still. The Las Vegas High Roller site reportedly cost about 1 million. Payoff is likely years. I do get your point about shade though.

I’m not sure how you could have a totally off-grid Supercharger site. Their Megapack batteries definitely have enough power for a Supercharger site. You just need enough panels to charge the battery enough for all of the cars that would charge there during the day+night and you would have to account for cloudy days. You could also waste the solar power if you had very sunny days and not many cars and the batteries were full. Keep in mind this is likely thousands of panels so you would need a decent sized field of solar relatively close by. All of that would of course be crazy expensive compared to any grid connection.

You do have great point. The Vegas charger is 8 pressure but is very expensive. I didn’t think about that far to be honest I was just wanting the shade hahahahaha. But this is true. They would need a large area to fill with panels. But the places with chargers already should add the solar over top to help.

 

[Reddy Kilowatt]

Let the digging begin. For those who know this site and Grease alley and Walmart, traffic can be a real bear. I got beeped at this morning just trying to grab a quick shot.They only got the black top off, but they did get across the road. This looks like a lot of power coming in. I wonder if Tesla would make this there long lost "Fairfax" site? I know we have Royal Farms now 3 miles up the road. Falls Church and Tyson's are that close also.

 

[Reddy Kilowatt]

They are setting the vault at the Electrify America site here in Chantilly. This cast a few bucks

 

[Big Earl]

They are setting the vault at the Electrify America site here in Chantilly. This cast a few bucks
View attachment 550440

Seems like the Dieselgate settlement dollars are paying for some very expensive charging station installations.

 

[Zhup]

Still no power as of last night...

 

[mcot222]

Seems like the Dieselgate settlement dollars are paying for some very expensive charging station installations.

Yah I worry what the investment will be like when the settlement money dries up. It doesn’t sound like they are interested in making it sustainable and profitable.

 

[YYZ-IAD]

I talked to hard hat construction guy behind the fence - out back of the charger.

It was not easy to extract info from him -- but he told me charger should open in 2 weeks. I'd put 50% weight on that comment - I'm not sure he was authority.

Patience, my friends - like always

 

[Reddy Kilowatt]

I talked to hard hat construction guy behind the fence - out back of the charger.

It was not easy to extract info from him -- but he told me charger should open in 2 weeks. I'd put 50% weight on that comment - I'm not sure he was authority.

Patience, my friends - like always

I think everyone has seen the Money Pit. How long? "Two Weeks"

They have worn this one out. It should have been powered by now. I think they had to add a vault in the building. I never saw transformer outside.


Chantilly is a cable vault, same as the Springfield Mall site was. I like that because they probably have built in enough future here for another carrier to install next to Electrify America. Hint Hint Tesla. At least 12 spaces still left next to EA.

 

[YYZ-IAD]

I stopped by again. No power. But there was a change. A soon as you enter "Kiss and Ride", there is a new sign pointing direction of the supercharger. progress - but not much

 

[Zhup]

And that column used to be orange and it's now red...

How about the columns inside? Are they red too?

 

[MarcoRP]

Seems like the Dieselgate settlement dollars are paying for some very expensive charging station installations.

How much would you ballpark per station? I mean, I found a permit for an EA installation somewhere in the US valued at 15 MILLION dollars. No it was not a typo, as there a few other permits filed by them as well.

Maybe VW is pocketing some of the funds?