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The future of fast, ubiquitous charging must be interoperability.

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Mayhem

Professional F5 Presser
Apr 27, 2018
180
148
USA
Is anyone other than me disturbed by the fragmented nature of current/future charging plans? It would seem Tesla, Porsche, VW, Rivan.... as well as charge-only providers such as Electrify America, Charge Point, et. al. are rolling out a future where only some chargers can charge some EVs, but not others.

Can you image it's the early 1900's and Fords can only fill up at a Ford gas station.... General Motors at a GM station, etc. Why does every company seem to have to reinvent what Tesla has done with the SC network?

While CCS does appear to be the front-runner fast charging standard, it is not the only one. It is the wild west here and nobody seems interested in getting on the same page!

Is there any push to a charging standard with EV interoperability?

Honestly by this point with Model 3 as successful as it's been and with most auto manufacturers promising EV models on the roads in the next few years, I would expect a 3rd party charge vendor to be setting up shop at convenience stores and rest stops across the US, but it really isn't happening (yet).

Is there anywhere in the rest of the world where EV adoption is higher than in the US, where we could look and see what our EV away-from-home charging future looks like?
 
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Honestly I think this is old thinking- the gas station mentality where you worry about having chargers available all over town.

I charge my car at home, nightly. It takes about 20 extra seconds after I park- versus wasting 5-10 minutes stopping as a gas station as I did in an ICE vehicle (or even longer wasted time I'd need to for any public charging option if it didn't happen to be located someplace I was already going to hang out otherwise)


The only time I care about a public charger of any kind is the rare road trip- and the SC network is already largely sufficient for that.... supplemented by places I can destination charge overnight with a J1772 adapter or an L2 tesla charger- both of which I've found at hotels and retail places....and it's really a non issue (for Teslas anyway).

CCS does seem to be what everyone else (and Tesla overseas) is moving to- so it won't shock me if Tesla eventually offers a CCS adapter (or as some have suggested offers adding a CCS port in addition to the Tesla one to US Teslas)... but I'm in no hurry for it.
 
Honestly I think this is old thinking- the gas station mentality where you worry about having chargers available all over town..

I mentioned it in my post, but probably didn't emphasize it enough.... I'm definitely talking about on-the-road and destination charging. SC network is good (could be better -- more locations, more stalls per station, etc) , but could be even better with collaboration from the rest of the current and upcoming market rather than fragmentation.
 
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Maybe pack energy density and/or size is the answer. When you can travel super-long distances, even if you are not doing the driving yourself (autonomous driving), traveling more than ~8hr without stops is brutal. Longer and longer ranges mean less frequent charging, less vehicles need charging at any one time and thus less charging stations needed.

This still does not address the 3-5yr near term when ranges still will be in the 200-400 mile range for most EV's.