Will Tesla Buildup Superchargers to Accommodate Anticipated Demand from Ford, GM, Rivian, and whoever else, Adopting NACS circa 2024/2025?

[Earl]

Surprised more Tesla owners are not up in arms about having to share your beloved Supercharger network! This was one of the main benefits of owning a Tesla… now it’s no longer unique to Tesla.
It will take years for the network to expand, and may never expand to fill demand. In the interim, you’ll find a Ford Mustang charging in the last Tesla charging stall!

Models S & X drivers groused about the same thing when the 3 came out. 1999 RAV4EV drivers groused about this when the Leaf and Volt came out, and 'their' SPI chargers were replaced with J-1772 that they couldn't even use, often cutting of where they could even go.
Don't worry, the rate of charger deployment has overall kept up and things are a whole lot better despite there being several orders of magnitude more cars sharing the infrastructure.
The infrastructure will grow/is growing even faster now. It isn't a zero sum game. I just came across a brand-new 25 stall V3 Supercharger site last night that's only about 2 miles from 2 often-full with 8 and 20 stalls, respectively.
The only sad thing to me is that I don't see a clear path to get the non-Tesla infrastructure up to a usable, sustainable level. The companies born from failures seem to have attracted management teams, ownership, and corporate culture of total losers. I only hope that Robert Barrossa can get EA whipped into shape but my hope is weak. Robert is smart, well-intentioned, and nice but, I'm afraid they need someone smart, well-intentioned, but an A-hole and rich - like Musk.

 

[threeputts]

Surprised more Tesla owners are not up in arms about having to share your beloved Supercharger network! This was one of the main benefits of owning a Tesla… now it’s no longer unique to Tesla.
It will take years for the network to expand, and may never expand to fill demand. In the interim, you’ll find a Ford Mustang charging in the last Tesla charging stall!

In the long run it's a plus. There are enough headwinds to EV adoption, anything that helps move it along is a good thing. Frankly I'm more concerned with more Teslas overcrowding superchargers, not current CCS cars. Tesla sold more EVs in the US in the first half of this year than all other brands combined. If deals with other makers gets more superchargers online faster it's all good.

 

[Richbot]

Free supercharging offered to anyone who takes delivery in the last week of any given sales quarter is a bigger threat to supercharger congestion than access available to other manufacturers. By like, several orders of magnitude

My total time waiting for a charger, in 3 years of ownership, has been about 5 minutes. Superchargers on my highway routes to the next major city are most always mostly-empty. But locally, you see people on temp tags from June or March or September or December pop in for a quick free charge on their way to work in the morning and you see rideshare drivers using the chargers to sleep/deep-charge to 100% for another shift

Teslas are better than some, but as you'll see in Kyle's videos, people who don't understand/care about the time it takes to deep charge can really screw up a charging site if they're trying to squeeze every penny out of their FUSC benefit

 

[HitchHiker71]

Telsa can build out fast, but there are a lot of moving parts to get a Supercharger on line. In some of the places by me the issue of the Electric utilities and local approval authorities being able to keep up. We have about 7-8 Superchargers sites within 10 miles of my house and within 15 miles 14 or more. So, Tesla can build them pretty quick. However, of those within 10 miles of my home at least one has been done for over 6 months, but still is not operation because of power company has not installed the transformer. The stalls are nicely lined out there and cleaned up, and the charging stands are installed and covered with padlocked canvas bags. The Tesla V3 Transformer is on site, but not the green power company transformer.

I've seen similar issues here in my state of Delaware. In my area, it's very popular for Royal Farms and/or Wawa convenience marts with gas stations to set up charging stations. Two of the newest SC stations within a few miles of my house are V3 250kw stations, one at a Royal Farms, the other at a Wawa. There are other RF and Wawa locations not far away where they have the room to set up a SC station, however the power lines in the ground and/or running to the actual facility aren't large enough to support a SC station, so these locations are at the mercy of the local power company to coordinate line upgrades along with the considerable costs for line upgrades (which are not insignificant - hence the IRA funding to incentivize locations to add charging stations). In some cases, the costs to do so are prohibitively expensive from what I've learned in talking with the store managers at said locations.

Personally I don't care so much about these local stations, since we have an L2 TWC at our house - so we only use SC stations when taking longer road trips or weekend trips. But I know getting SC stations installed in suburban or rural locations often come with challenges getting the amount of power needed to that location.

 

[Earl]

Teslas are better than some, but as you'll see in Kyle's videos, people who don't understand/care about the time it takes to deep charge can really screw up a charging site if they're trying to squeeze every penny out of their FUSC benefit

This is not as big an issue as in the past. Basically charging to 100% versus 80% about doubles the time spent Supercharging, thus about halving the capacity of the network. Given that Tesla defaults max charge at high-usage sites to 80% and sends warnings via the app about it helps educate, thus eliminate, many of those "people who don't understand" and I doubt there are as many who don't care when there is a line waiting to be too much of a problem. Rarely, when the next charging opportunity is a long way off, I'll sit to the upper 90's% and I'm sure others do as well but I can't imagine that is a big, overall problem and with more charging stations, the times this is needed are decreasing as well.

 

[RayK]

And another domino falls, this time in the Far East:

Nissan to adopt Tesla's EV charging standard from 2025

Japanese automaker's decision could sway compatriot carmakers

asia.nikkei.com

Will Honda and Toyota be far behind?

 

[Richbot]

Honda's EV future is tied pretty closely to GM's so they're a given IMO, at least for anything they sell in north america

 

[TunaBug]

And another domino falls, this time in the Far East:

Nissan to adopt Tesla's EV charging standard from 2025

Japanese automaker's decision could sway compatriot carmakers

asia.nikkei.com

Will Honda and Toyota be far behind?

I'm curious who will be last to make the switch. My list of "not a leader in EVs" is Toyota, EA, and Honda.

 

[houstonian]

I'm curious who will be last to make the switch. My list of "not a leader in EVs" is Toyota, EA, and Honda.

Would have thrown out VW group too but CNBC reports they're in talks with Tesla to adopt NACS as of late June 2023.

 

[CSFTN]

I'm curious who will be last to make the switch. My list of "not a leader in EVs" is Toyota, EA, and Honda.

Lucid

 

[Samurai51]

I'm curious who will be last to make the switch. My list of "not a leader in EVs" is Toyota, EA, and Honda.

Well, EA announced last month that they will start incorporating NACS in their chargers. As previously noted, Honda has basically sub-contracted their EV work in North America to GM -- so I don't see how they fail to go NACS.

Lucid? Unless they get their SUV to market soon, they simply won't be relevant to the discussion (and even the SUV might not save them if their Saudi backing falls away).

Porsche supposedly said "no," but they are a niche player in North America. If the market continues in the NACS direction, they will have zero choice.

Volkswagen? They've admitted to being in talks with Tesla about NACS. Because VW has made such effort towards EVs, I tend to think that they are looking at this rationally and will make the smart (NACS) move. However, one of the reasons they fired Herbert Dietz is because he was perceived to be too chummy with Elon. Might they fear looking stupid about that now? Perhaps, but I don't think it will be enough to sway the best decision for them.

My money would be on Toyota, with Stellantis as a wild-card. Toyota is stuck in the past, flailing around, and wasting far too much $$$ on hydrogen. The BZ4X screams "we didn't want to do this...we HAD to." It does not stand out positively against the competition in any aspect that I can see. Also, for the past decade they've perpetually claimed to be "about two years away" from introducing a solid state battery. A smoke-and-mirrors excuse to not do anything right now.

Stellantis's CEO is very erratic when it comes to talking about EVs, and they are late to market. I also strongly suspect they are over-hyping the RAM EV. All of which seems to indicate they do not have their act together. So their announcement could come today or it might take a very long time. They will almost certainly go NACS eventually, but it may be a painfully slow process for them.

 

[Rocky_H]

My money would be on Toyota, with Stellantis as a wild-card. Toyota is stuck in the past, flailing around, and wasting far too much $$$ on hydrogen. The BZ4X screams "we didn't want to do this...we HAD to." It does not stand out positively against the competition in any aspect that I can see. Also, for the past decade they've perpetually claimed to be "about two years away" from introducing a solid state battery. A smoke-and-mirrors excuse to not do anything right now.

This is the best elaborated description of everything I've been seeing about Toyota in this space. They have been actively antagonistic toward EVs, including commercials criticizing them, and promote hybrid and hydrogen for the now and the future, respectively, to get people to shun EVs.

 

[HitchHiker71]

This is the best elaborated description of everything I've been seeing about Toyota in this space. They have been actively antagonistic toward EVs, including commercials criticizing them, and promote hybrid and hydrogen for the now and the future, respectively, to get people to shun EVs.

Toyota is also spending millions lobbying in DC to slow down EV adoption since they were caught with their pants down so to speak. They are trying very hard to reverse the narrative in the mainstream media and via any/all mass media and lobbying mechanisms at their disposal.

 

[Richbot]

Toyota is slow moving but when they move, the world moves - and they are moving toward battery electrics now, while also selling a hybridized version of everything they sell except the Supra and 86. A huge portion of those are hybridized as standard, and not just mild 48volt hybrid, traction battery hybrid. And unlike almost every other manufacturer in this conversation, they've been doing it at ever-increasing scale since the 1990's. They had pilot EV projects on the road back then too, and got data they used to make strategic decisions. They have continued studying the problem, and now they're moving.

Toyota is also 100% correct that electrifying the entire fleet should be a priority over concentrating limited batteries in only a few cars, and they continue to walk the walk of electrification by selling more electrified vehicles so far than all other manufacturers combined since they started selling the Prius. It's not all-or-nothing, this-or-that.

Getting more older, less-efficient cars off the road, more quickly, at low cost to the consumer, ought to be a high priority. Right now it can't be done with battery electrics at scale. It remains to be seen if battery supply constraints will be an actual constraint on production. But if you wanted to take all of the batteries sold today, and make every F-series sold next year a Lightning, it wouldn't work. You wouldn't be able to make enough of one vehicle with all the batteries in the entire world.

Meanwhile, I'm interested in EV's because they're dynamically pretty awesome compared to ICE cars, but most EV's are over-powered and overweight, with too much battery, but hey, I like fast, and I like long range, and I can afford it. Teslas could be more afordable, less battery-intensive and more efficient if they all had half as much horsepower, but, alas, the consumer wants what it wants, I guess? When the top-selling ICE cars are slow as frozen bat crap sliding down a cave wall, it baffles me a bit that we see so many 300+hp EV's when 150hp with no downshifts is more than enough to impress almost anybody driving a Rogue or Camry today.

I don't know what Stellantis is doing. I can't tell if they're serious or not.

 

[stopcrazypp]

Toyota is slow moving but when they move, the world moves - and they are moving toward battery electrics now, while also selling a hybridized version of everything they sell except the Supra and 86. A huge portion of those are hybridized as standard, and not just mild 48volt hybrid, traction battery hybrid.

Toyota is also 100% correct that electrifying the entire fleet should be a priority over concentrating limited batteries in only a few cars, and they continue to walk the walk of electrification by selling more electrified vehicles so far than all other manufacturers combined since they started selling the Prius. It's not all-or-nothing, this-or-that.

It remains to be seen if battery supply constraints will be an actual constraint on production. But if you wanted to take all of the batteries sold today, and make every F-series sold next year a Lightning, it wouldn't work. You wouldn't be able to make enough of one vehicle with all the batteries in the entire world.

Except that is false equivalence that anti-EV naysayers have always brought up. The batteries used by hybrids are not the same as the ones used by EVs. The production capacity strain Toyota is experiencing for their plugins is because they didn't invest in the factories due to their long running EV foot dragging, not because there is a materials zero sum game between hybrids and EVs in the industry.

Toyota also have over exaggerated their hybrid significance.
For example, they sold 504,016 electrified vehicles (this includes hybrids, PHEVs, BEVs) in 2022 in the US.

Toyota Motor North America Reports Year-End 2022 U.S. Sales Results - Toyota USA Newsroom

PLANO, Texas (Jan. 4, 2023) – Toyota Motor North America (TMNA) today reported year-end 2022 U.S. sales of 2,108,458 vehicles, a decrease of 9.6 percent on a volume basis and a decrease of 9.9 percent on a daily selling rate (DSR) basis compared to 2021.

pressroom.toyota.com

Tesla sold 536,069 pure BEVs in 2022:

Tesla Sales Figures – US Market

Automotive Sales Data and Statistics

www.goodcarbadcar.net

So despite all the Toyota misleading stats about 90 hybrids per EV, they aren't selling 90x the hybrids as EVs, in fact they are selling less.

 

[Earl]

Toyota is slow moving but when they move, the world moves

Yawn. That's what people said about GM - in the early 1970's. How has that worked out?

moving toward battery electrics now, while also selling a hybridized version of everything they sell except the Supra and 86. A huge portion of those are hybridized as standard

Hybrids are just a stalling tactic to preserve the status quo of the ICE. Toyota's advertising them as "electrified" and "self-charging", along with promotion of Hydrogen fool sells and solid state batteries are just further delaying tactics.

Toyota is also 100% correct that electrifying the entire fleet should be a priority over concentrating limited batteries in only a few cars, and they continue to walk the walk of electrification

Read the propaganda much?
The only thing Toyota is 100% dedicated to is guaranteeing an ICE in every vehicle. This avoids the need to retool their facilities and staffing.

Teslas could be more afordable, less battery-intensive and more efficient if they all had half as much horsepower

This is not true with BEVS. The more horsepower, the more efficient the electric motor. Larger batteries increase the weight on the wheels, hence cause the tires to have a bit more drag but, they do enable the cars to do more (hence accelerate adoption), charge at more opportune times for the grid (helps with adoption of renewable energy sources), and allow the battery to last longer due to less stress from full charge/discharge cycles (remember that short-range Nissan Leafs went through 2 batteries in 10years/100K miles versus Teslas that have not even gone through one battery in that time). Then, the hybrid must drag the ICE weight around with them even if it seldom gets used. Then, let's think about the environmental damage of having to fire up an ICE just to drive more than 20 miles like Toyota's lame PHEVs.

 

[HitchHiker71]

Toyota is slow moving but when they move, the world moves - and they are moving toward battery electrics now, while also selling a hybridized version of everything they sell except the Supra and 86. A huge portion of those are hybridized as standard, and not just mild 48volt hybrid, traction battery hybrid. And unlike almost every other manufacturer in this conversation, they've been doing it at ever-increasing scale since the 1990's. They had pilot EV projects on the road back then too, and got data they used to make strategic decisions. They have continued studying the problem, and now they're moving.

Toyota is also 100% correct that electrifying the entire fleet should be a priority over concentrating limited batteries in only a few cars, and they continue to walk the walk of electrification by selling more electrified vehicles so far than all other manufacturers combined since they started selling the Prius. It's not all-or-nothing, this-or-that.

We shall see how correct they are ten years from now, only time will tell. Japanese companies are legendary for their ability to hone efficiencies however their culture works against adoption of major changes in direction within short time periods, which is likely why Toyota and others find themselves playing catchup.

Getting more older, less-efficient cars off the road, more quickly, at low cost to the consumer, ought to be a high priority. Right now it can't be done with battery electrics at scale. It remains to be seen if battery supply constraints will be an actual constraint on production. But if you wanted to take all of the batteries sold today, and make every F-series sold next year a Lightning, it wouldn't work. You wouldn't be able to make enough of one vehicle with all the batteries in the entire world.

Tesla's goal is to accelerate the transition to clean energy and sustainable energy production. That is exactly what they are doing, effectively forcing the rest of the legacy automotive industry, Toyota included, to adapt and transform. Project Highland will likely utilize FRP/M3P CATL batteries in entirety - meaning the rare metals that contribute to battery supply constraints will disappear - as both lithium and iron are abundant globally. In other words, the production constraints will be shortlived as most BEV manufacturers shift to FRP/M3P batteries, or even sodium ion batteries, that have virtually zero fire risk, and last much longer than NMC batteries - along the lines of 20 years from a cycling standpoint - and these batteries keep 90% of their capacity over that lifecycle. The new M3 is starting production now in Shanghai - so these 2nd gen FRP batteries are here today.

Meanwhile, I'm interested in EV's because they're dynamically pretty awesome compared to ICE cars, but most EV's are over-powered and overweight, with too much battery, but hey, I like fast, and I like long range, and I can afford it. Teslas could be more afordable, less battery-intensive and more efficient if they all had half as much horsepower, but, alas, the consumer wants what it wants, I guess? When the top-selling ICE cars are slow as frozen bat crap sliding down a cave wall, it baffles me a bit that we see so many 300+hp EV's when 150hp with no downshifts is more than enough to impress almost anybody driving a Rogue or Camry today.

I don't know what Stellantis is doing. I can't tell if they're serious or not.

EVs are much more efficient than any ICE vehicle - about 80% efficient whereas ICE averages only 40% at best. The electric motors are far more efficient in other words - which is why BEV vehicles can perform so much better than ICE vehicles - but I take your point that things can always be better - and undoubtedly we'll see continued improvements in efficiency and in battery packs/density/BMS/longevity over time. We've had 150HP BEVs for over a decade now (Nissan Leaf, Chevy Volt, Chevy Bolt, etc.), they never sold well. The Tesla robotaxi will likely be more along the line of what you're describing though.

 

[Samurai51]

Toyota is slow moving but when they move, the world moves - and they are moving toward battery electrics now, while also selling a hybridized version of everything they sell except the Supra and 86. A huge portion of those are hybridized as standard, and not just mild 48volt hybrid, traction battery hybrid. And unlike almost every other manufacturer in this conversation, they've been doing it at ever-increasing scale since the 1990's. They had pilot EV projects on the road back then too, and got data they used to make strategic decisions. They have continued studying the problem, and now they're moving.

Toyota is also 100% correct that electrifying the entire fleet should be a priority over concentrating limited batteries in only a few cars, and they continue to walk the walk of electrification by selling more electrified vehicles so far than all other manufacturers combined since they started selling the Prius. It's not all-or-nothing, this-or-that.

Getting more older, less-efficient cars off the road, more quickly, at low cost to the consumer, ought to be a high priority. Right now it can't be done with battery electrics at scale. It remains to be seen if battery supply constraints will be an actual constraint on production. But if you wanted to take all of the batteries sold today, and make every F-series sold next year a Lightning, it wouldn't work. You wouldn't be able to make enough of one vehicle with all the batteries in the entire world.

Meanwhile, I'm interested in EV's because they're dynamically pretty awesome compared to ICE cars, but most EV's are over-powered and overweight, with too much battery, but hey, I like fast, and I like long range, and I can afford it. Teslas could be more afordable, less battery-intensive and more efficient if they all had half as much horsepower, but, alas, the consumer wants what it wants, I guess? When the top-selling ICE cars are slow as frozen bat crap sliding down a cave wall, it baffles me a bit that we see so many 300+hp EV's when 150hp with no downshifts is more than enough to impress almost anybody driving a Rogue or Camry today.

I don't know what Stellantis is doing. I can't tell if they're serious or not.

I certainly don't hate Toyota. I've owned a couple Toyota's in the past and liked them both. When a young relative of mine was just entering the work force last year, she asked me what car she should purchase. I advised her to get a used Corolla, "You will make enough money and be ready to buy something else before you can wear it out. They last and last."

But, Toyota are stuck in the past. I lived in Japan for nearly three years and I think I understand some of the institutional resistance to EVs. Most of the urban areas are extremely cramped. Finding a place to park is frequently an enormous hassle, and squeezing into some of those tiny parking slots is a pain. Now imagine adding in charging infrastructure into those already space-challenged conditions. It is daunting to think about, and there are no easy answers.

Even outside of urban areas, the parking mentality permeates -- they often only allocate the absolute bare minimum of space for parking slots, no matter how much extra real estate is available.

I would be more amenable to accepting the assertion that Toyota is just being careful and meticulous, if their first pure EV mass production offering wasn't obviously such a half-a$$ed effort.

When most of the remaining legacy auto companies put out their first EV models, I can at least find a few things I really like about nearly every one of them. The BZ4X, on the other hand, is a giant nothing-burger. They are going to make the "world move"? I guess doubling over with laughter is a move.

 

[threeputts]

Porsche supposedly said "no," but they are a niche player in North America. If the market continues in the NACS direction, they will have zero choice.

Volkswagen? They've admitted to being in talks with Tesla about NACS. Because VW has made such effort towards EVs, I tend to think that they are looking at this rationally and will make the smart (NACS) move. However, one of the reasons they fired Herbert Dietz is because he was perceived to be too chummy with Elon. Might they fear looking stupid about that now? Perhaps, but I don't think it will be enough to sway the best decision for them.

Unless something has changed recently VW owns Porsche and Audi. Seems to me if VW makes that switch they would make it for all their brands.

 

[Amanfromconn]

I’m not worried about super chargers by my house. I’m worried about super chargers along the interstates in rural parts of the country for commuting long distances.

My co-worker was worried about not enough charger on the road. I told her you mostly charge your car at home. You don't drive 250 miles a day just to run errant. Super charger are for long distance out off state and people who live in apartments. Some people still think that you have to drive to a charging station to charge a car just like filling up gas tank. It's gonna take awhile for non-tech savvy old timers to get used to the idea that you have a gas station at home right in your garage. You don't need to leave the house.