Supercharging rates go WAY up!

[iwannam3]

Since most Model 3s don't have free supercharging I'm posting it here. Local rate in Vancouver WA started at $0.11/kwh, early in 2018 then went to $0.24 and today, a year later, went to $0.31!! My home power is $0.0816. Even with demand charges, power factor charges etc I am sure their industrial rate is less than I am paying.here. Are we getting close to $3 gasoline equivalent? I have solar panels and charge at home like most, but road trip cost has gone up significantly. And renters and condo owners costs have gone way up too.

Doesn't look like local power rates affect the price, making a LOT more profit in the Northwest than in high power cost areas like California. Shouldn't it be a % markup based on local power rates, not a near flat fee? And when is the next 30+% rate hike?

https://electrek.co/2019/01/18/tesla-increases-supercharger-prices/

 

[Mattzilla]

My car has free supercharging for life so I'm cool with it.

 

[gilscales]

I'm fine with that, I only charge at SC's when traveling, Looks like in CA it's now $0.32 to $0.36 from $0.26 so while a significant jump I will be traveling for about $0.10 a mile or with todays gas prices the equivalent of 30 to 35 mpg. not as good as the 50 to 60 mpg. I figured before but gas has come down and the SC rates went up, My main thing is I pay $0.12 at home so still like getting 100 mpg!

Could be Tesla has finally realized that they need a faster rollout of new SC's and a way to pay for them, that's my hope anyway, it would be nice if they add so many that they are within 50 miles of each other no matter the direction you traveled someday

 

[KenF]

I suspect some who gave up free supercharging for a $5000 rebate may eventually regret their decision. I fully expect similar price hikes in the next 6-12 months, especially after Tesla starts selling a cheaper Model 3 and deploys Supercharger v3. OTOH, I expect Tesla to lower the cost of their wall charger in the same time frame, to encourage more home installations.

 

[Toumal]

It's still cheaper than Ionity, but that is not saying much. They are clearly also trying to regulate SC demand.
My only hope is that their pricing also comes down again when possible. Many operators in Europe built up using subsidies from the Ten-T project and others, then got major investments from the petrochemical industry while raising prices almost to gasoline-equilibrium.

 

[David_Cary]

Maybe there should be a qualifier - have free unlimited supercharging.
I voted that I am ok with it to pay for the buildout. I have unlimited supercharging so I have zero skin in the game....(sort of like voting for someone who will raise income taxes when you don't pay any yourself)

Given the gas prices today, they probably need to take away the cost savings from their website. Certainly if someone has to supercharge because of their home situation, there is zero savings. It is even more expensive in CA (I suspect) and that is their largest market.

Charging on the road should be more expensive than home. That just makes sense. The install cost needs to be paid for, the rent on the land or the land acquisition cost needs to be paid for. Tesla is really trying to get past operating like a non profit or charity.

 

[Garlan Garner]

My car has free supercharging for life so I'm cool with it.

Me too.

( And they wanted to trade my FUSC for $5k.... lol.... glad I didn't ).

 

[Garlan Garner]

Maybe there should be a qualifier - have free unlimited supercharging.
I voted that I am ok with it to pay for the buildout. I have unlimited supercharging so I have zero skin in the game....(sort of like voting for someone who will raise income taxes when you don't pay any yourself)

Given the gas prices today, they probably need to take away the cost savings from their website. Certainly if someone has to supercharge because of their home situation, there is zero savings. It is even more expensive in CA (I suspect) and that is their largest market.

Charging on the road should be more expensive than home. That just makes sense. The install cost needs to be paid for, the rent on the land or the land acquisition cost needs to be paid for. Tesla is really trying to get past operating like a non profit or charity.

If Supercharging prices ever get to matching or going above comparable gas prices....then.. I believe the Tesla EV movement will experience a sales slowdown of sorts.

 

[SageBrush]

Even with demand charges, power factor charges etc I am sure their industrial rate is less than I am paying here.

What industrial rate are you paying ?

Doesn't look like local power rates affect the price

Just the opposite, it looks like (and Tesla says) that the prices now incorporate demand charges. My locality charges $30 a kW so e.g. a 10 station SC location could owe 30*120*10 = $36,000 a month just in demand charges.

The solution to this is battery storage, +/- VRE (not the bacteria) to feed the batteries. I'm confident that is coming but Tesla is on a mission to be profitable every quarter so freebies are going away.

 

[SageBrush]

At 28 cents a minute, I end up paying around 4.4 cents an EPA mile during road trips.

Model 3 LR Supercharger kW by SoC

 

[Garlan Garner]

At 28 cents a minute, I end up paying around 4.4 cents an EPA mile during road trips.

Model 3 LR Supercharger kW by SoC

The price of electricity as in your calculations.....400 miles of travel ( full tank of my ICE car gas ) it would cost me 1,760 pennies or $29.

The EV market had better be careful because an EV full tank of charging is approaching ICE gas prices. hmmmm

 

[swaltner]

What industrial rate are you paying ?


Just the opposite, it looks like (and Tesla says) that the prices now incorporate demand charges. My locality charges $30 a kW so e.g. a 10 station SC location could owe 30*120*10 = $36,000 a month just in demand charges.

The solution to this is battery storage, +/- VRE (not the bacteria) to feed the batteries. I'm confident that is coming but Tesla is on a mission to be profitable every quarter so freebies are going away.

You forgot the paired Superchargers, so your demand calculation is a little high.. For your example of a 10 stall site (5 pairs at 145 kW per pair), it’s really $30 * 145 * 5 or $21,750. Still significant, but not as bad as the number you calculated. The demand charge here in Kansas is closer to $10/kW, so even smaller still, but that doesn’t change it for your sites.

 

[2012MS85]

In many markets like mine (Iowa/Midwest), Tesla has just lost a key economic benefit of being able to say a Tesla road trip is cheaper than petroleum in an ICE vehicle of similar size. Iowa’s Supercharging cost just doubled ($.31/kWh now vs $0.16 when I left town for vacation last week). In my month of owning my 3, I am getting about 3 miles for every kWh; that’s roughly 10 cents per mile if Supercharging. We left our 3 and S in the garage and drove the Volt to O’Hare because extreme cold was forecast while on vacation. My Volt is similar in size to my 3, and it gets 35mpg on gas. I filled up with 91 octane premium for $2.45/gallon. So ignoring the battery (that only gets about 30 miles in the cold), the ICE-side of my Volt cost me only 7 cents per mile for fuel. That’s 30% cheaper than my 3 (using new Supercharging rates in Iowa/Illinois). Folks shouldn’t lose sight of the big picture (home charging using my solar panels has a lifetime cost of only 2-3 cents per mile), but Tesla soon won’t be able to show its Supercharger savings vs gas. And that was a key selling point for many.

 

[veerrrsix]

The EV market had better be careful because an EV full tank of charging is approaching ICE gas prices. hmmmm

Two thoughts about this comment:
1. I suspect that most people are not using fuel cost as a motivating factor for an EV purchase, specifically not a Tesla purchase and especially not with the current “cheap” gas prices. At any rate, home charging and public non-DCFC remain considerably less expensive than ICE fuel once the initial investment cost to install an EVSE is paid off in savings. With that in mind,
2. Superchargers aren’t meant to be a primary fuel source, just a travel convenience/enabler. If this price increase further discourages supercharger misuse, it’s a win for everyone who intends to use them as designed.

 

[Garlan Garner]

Two thoughts about this comment:
1. I suspect that most people are not using fuel cost as a motivating factor for an EV purchase, specifically not a Tesla purchase and especially not with the current “cheap” gas prices. At any rate, home charging and public non-DCFC remain considerably less expensive than ICE fuel once the initial investment cost to install an EVSE is paid off in savings. With that in mind,
2. Superchargers aren’t meant to be a primary fuel source, just a travel convenience/enabler. If this price increase further discourages supercharger misuse, it’s a win for everyone who intends to use them as designed.

Fair enough except that Tesla hasn't made any provisions or statements to prevent SC;ing from being a primary source of fuel for anyone. Especially since they seem to now be profiting off of them.

Why would they discourage anyone from using a profitable entity?

Initially Tesla was trying to avoid congestion of local charging getting in the way of long distance charging. Outside of California....there seems to be very little supercharger congestion across the US. Indicated in my recent threads regarding Thanksgiving and Christmas supercharging congestion ( top 2 most traveled days of the year in US ).

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

I vote yes, because that's the best of the options.
I'm looking for the "I guess".

I don't _think_ this is Tesla making Supercharging a profit center. There are two important reasons to do it:
1) Tesla wants to continue a build-out of the Supercharger network even while in overall cost-cutting mode. They don't want a repeat of 2018Q3 where they drastically cut Supercharger activity, and have got behind the Model 3 rollout in some locations. So, they're now shifting more of the costs away from the car and onto the network.
2) In order to keep network costs down, Tesla needs to encourage people to charge at home where possible. Particularly in California, with its tiered pricing, Supercharging could be cheaper than home charging.

But this _really_ sucks for all the people who've bought a Tesla with expectation of charging on the Supercharger network, who are now seeing a huge spike in their fuel prices.

This is an indication of how public charging economics suck and why Tesla wanted to try to build some of the network pricing into the car.

 

[Garlan Garner]

I vote yes, because that's the best of the options.
I'm looking for the "I guess".

I don't _think_ this is Tesla making Supercharging a profit center. There are two important reasons to do it:
1) Tesla wants to continue a build-out of the Supercharger network even while in overall cost-cutting mode. They don't want a repeat of 2018Q3 where they drastically cut Supercharger activity. So, they're now shifting more of the costs away from the car and onto the network,
2) In order to keep network costs down, Tesla needs to encourage people to charge at home where possible. Particularly in California, with its tiered pricing, Supercharging could be cheaper than home charging.

But this _really_ sucks for all the people who've bought a Tesla with expectation of charging on the Supercharger network, who are now seeing a huge spike in their fuel prices.

Tesla's statement is that they will use the price increase ( profits ) as a financial source to install additional SC's.

If that's not making a profit off of then.....

Sure....they aren't using the profits to build up their bank account, but a profit is a profit no matter what they are doing with the increased rate money.

 

[spinbackwards]

Howdy,

I'm concerned about a world where cost is such a priority.

I've seen what happens when software is free, what the economy looks like when a few companies are in control.

For me, I think of value. If Tesla is increasing costs, they're doing so because it's needed for growth. I'm all for it.

Peace and love,

 

[TeeEmCee]

Howdy,

I'm concerned about a world where cost is such a priority.

I've seen what happens when software is free, what the economy looks like when a few companies are in control.

For me, I think of value. If Tesla is increasing costs, they're doing so because it's needed for growth. I'm all for it.

Peace and love,

What they need it for is survival. It reeks a bit of desperation and will likely have a non-negligible impact on demand. If EV travel is also becoming expensive, on top of already being inconvenient, then many will just get an EV for commuting and local errands, and for that there’s a growing number of options that Tesla will have a hard time competing with.

Free charging was never going to work but pushing EV charging costs up this much will earn them nothing but scorn, i.m.o.

 

[Garlan Garner]

What they need it for is survival. It reeks a bit of desperation and will likely have a non-negligible impact on demand. If EV travel is also becoming expensive, on top of already being inconvenient, then many will just get an EV for commuting and local errands, and for that there’s a growing number of options that Tesla will have a hard time competing with.

Free charging was never going to work but pushing EV charging costs up this much will earn them nothing but scorn, i.m.o.

Free charging is all over the place. Not at Tesla SC's but its everywhere.

Plugshare.

Personally I don't believe the cost of the electricity is the issue for Tesla. I believe the issue is the cost of the parts and infrastructure.
I believe that if Tesla could get the parts / infrastructure for free.....there would be NO charging increases ever.