MNL: How people use Leaf in Europe - QC as needed

lol, there is 1 in Nor Cal AFAIK. You do have some tesla quick chargers. The problem is the standard isn't really a standard yet. It came from TEPCO, and now is being run by the COO of Nissan. Since TEPCO controlled much of the japanese infrastructure, pre melt down, they installed many of them. Tesla has some other format fast chargers. It would be great if Nissan/Tesla/ford etc got a standard DC fast charger through for the united states. They are starting to put eVgo chargers outside of walgreens in houston, that can quick charge leafs or teslas with 480VDC. If people use them NRG will put them on the corridors between major texas cities.

They put a couple 240V chargers (24miles of charge in an hour) in the parking lot of the park I was at yesterday. I think leafs can't charge that fast off 240 though. That may be a better location to wait around for a charge.

 

mm they did not leave the country and to the looks of it kept on going in rounds to get to the 1200km+
the trip is based on where i can find a QS i will drive idear

i was hoping this trip was from amsterdam down to france or germany ( berlin ) and back?
QS on the road.
this is nothing....

a round trip from amsterdam to berlin without a QS would take +3 days non stop driving and charging.
with QS down the road it would take 5 hours of charging and about 6 to 7 hours of driving a total of 12 hours instead of 3 days trip.

it would be great if that trip was made and also possible.....

 

One of the down sides to being a pioneer is that you venture into territory that lacks infrastructure. This is why (contrary to much preening) early Prius owners were not really pioneers. We were buying a relatively new technology (though in the U.S., and much more so with the Gen II, it was not even all that new). But all the infrastructure was in place: roads and gas stations.

But in the case of EVs, we have limited recharging opportunities. We can charge at home, rather slowly for the most part. There are a few QC stations, but not many, and many of us EV drivers have no QC stations anywhere we might want to drive. This limits the utility of our cars, and makes it necessary for many of us to have a second car that burns gas, or to compromise with a REEV like the Volt or the microscopic EV range of a PHV.

It's the inconvenience/difficulty we accept in return for being able to drive electric at least part of the time. But the more EVs, PHVs, and REEVs are on the road, the more companies and entrepreneurs will see a market for QC stations. The chicken and egg problem is really not a matter of which comes first, but rather a relationship where the two develop together. In this case a few EVs are put on the road by people who are willing to do without QC stations; then a few QC stations are installed by people who see a future in them, which allows more people to buy EVs, which prompts more QC stations, and it spirals upwards.

It's still early in the process. Most people still don't think an EV is worth it. But as the spiral continues, and simultaneously gas prices rise with growing world demand and declining reserves of cheaply-available oil, more and more people will come to EVs. Europe is ahead of us, as they are in most things. We tend to be far more short-sighted. But it's coming.

 

my take;

 

Just googled it CHAdeMO in vacavile, CA.
http://www.recargo.com/sites/1138?photopage=2
But it appears down because TEPCO didn't get UL listing. That doesn't appear to be a problem with the eVgo's which IIRC have sockets for the leafs, but are not in California. Southern california seems to be getting some eaton fast chargers with CHAdeMO connectors.

That seems like a real problem with the current infrastructure and long trips. Many cities seem to be getting set up for the ev user that just needs to add a little more range.

 

I've said this before: I think the future of public charging is cars that can drive all day on a charge, and hotels/motels offering an 8-hour full charge overnight for a fee just a little cheaper than the typical gas bill for the same number of miles. Fast charging in the middle of the driving day will become an anachronism once batteries can provide an all-day drive.

I'm not usually an optimist, and I don't normally make predictions about the future, but I am optimistic about the gradual increase in battery capacity by cost and weight. Yes, the 300-mile Tesla Model S is $70K and only about half-way to an all-day range. But a decade ago, the best electric cars were around 100 miles. If we don't blow ourselves to hell in a nuclear war, or let the next bunch of big-business crooks and corrupt politicians bring our economic house down around our ears, or burn the last of the petroleum without building a sustainable energy infrastructure, technology will continue to make slow and steady progress. And if any of those things happen, then fast-charging stations won't do us any good anyway.

I'm already able to do 95% of my driving electric. Yes, I have an expensive car with a 245-mile range. But the only times I've driven farther in a day that I could have done in a Leaf were days I went joyriding in the country because my car was new.

 

Thanks for the link. Too bad about the UL listing, you would think they could somehow get it around the lawyers. Then again history argues against the following reasoning -

 

^ The issue is not the safety of the charger, it's the messed-up legal system where juries who have no technical knowledge get to make decisions based on technical details. Say someone gets hurt: If the device has a UL listing, the company can argue that they had every reason to believe it was safe, and therefore they should not be held liable, and the jury is likely to side with them.

But if someone just claims to have been hurt, even though he was not, or his injury had nothing to do with the device, if the device is not UL listed, his lawyer will ask, "Why did you install a device that was not UL listed?" The jury, understanding nothing of cars, electricity, or chargers, is likely to side with the plaintiff.

It has nothing to do with the actual safety of the device, and everything to do with a legal system where the outcome has nothing to do with facts, and everything to do with the skill and preparedness of the lawyers and the emotional impact on jurors who are utterly unqualified to decide the issue, and where the technicalities of the law matter far more than common sense.

Then add to this that the charger is owned by a company that probably views EVs as a side issue, good for publicity and nothing else.

 

Here is a new information regarding charging station planning in California. Well more of a teaser regarding the recent grant.

http://thepinetree.net/index.php?module=announce&ANN_user_op=view&ANN_id=28820

 

and WHY do you think that is ... after all, there has to be a reason that manufacturers of NON existent EV's want badly, to NOT have Chademo Q.C.'s become the standard (hint ... follow the money) though they quickly are becoming just that. BTW, there are a couple Chademo Q.C.'s in So Cal right now, with a 3rd one being installed around san juan capistrano, and more around San Diego. It IS strange ... less than 5 in all of California ... yet look at plughare dot com maps ... over a dozen or so around central Tennessee area. Of course ... TN practically gives their electricity away, compared to many other states. I've Q.C.'d a few times ... and it's REALLY cool. First time (using an 'EATON' brand Chademo) I hooked up with about 35% remaining and went to about 80% - in just 12 minutes. You get enough Chademos up and running all over the landscape, and it won't be such a big deal to have short range BEV's. The least expensive Chademo offered for sale now is about $9K, without any incentives/rebates ... so they're already getting less & less expensive.
.

 

Fast chargers are lacking here in the UK. I think there are about 30 of them at the moment - mostly in Nissan showrooms, and thus not open 24/7.

However, Nissan are in the process of introducing fast chargers at service stations on the main motorway network;

Car Dealer Magazine » Fast chargers on m-ways?

They also want ALL their UK Nissan dealers (not just the ones selling the Leaf) to install a fast charger for use by Leaf drivers;

Green Car Congress: Nissan outlines EV expansion plans for Europe

I know the US is much, much bigger than the UK but it is a very important market for Nissan so I wonder why Nissan don't pay to install fast chargers on one East/West highway or even just install them on a popular freeway system in California, such as linking San Francisco to Los Angeles to enable users to travel between these two big hubs without worry? It's just under 400 miles, so would require 8 fastchargers or 16 if you have one on each side of the freeway.

It would be a fantastic press opportunity!

 

I thought the Leaf uses J1772. How did you use a Chademo?

It's not sufficient to have one charger each 50 or so miles. You need enough chargers for the volume of use. And that volume will grow with the number of cars.

It will happen, but it takes time, and will require an ever-growing number of chargers.

I don't like to drive long distances. If I'm going to go 400 miles, I'll fly if I can. I drive to Canada only because I cannot fly to where I want to go. If there was air service to Revelstoke, Golden, Lake Louise, Banff, Jasper, and Waterton, I might sell my Prius and go 100% electric for my personal transportation. And that's without any prospect of fast charging on my routes up to Canada. Otherwise, for me to make my trips all electric there'd need to be fast charging in Nelson, Cranbrook, Golden, Revelstoke, and Lake Louise, to cover all the area I drive around to get to my hiking places. And I'd have to be certain the charger would be available when I get there. One charger out of service and I'd be stuck trying to find somewhere I could charge overnight. A line-up could be almost as bad. I don't expect those small towns to have fast charging before I'm too old for hiking.

 

Chedemo is not UL listed, that is why. If they, headed by a guy from nissan, wants to be a standard, they need to at a minimum follow us standards. The plug interface does not look all that great either. If you think its a vast conspiracy by Tesla, who is building their own standard, then talk to elon. There are some at walgreens in texas, but these are not chedemo units, but compatible. If chedemo wants to be the one standard they need to get manufacturers on board themselves. Some don't like the plug for technical reasons, some don't want to pay chadmo licensing fees.

 

I will buy an electric car when I can drive from New York to Florida, charging the car at service centers along I-95 and at hotels and taking no longer than the two driving days it takes now. Cars would have to have a range of about 300 miles and be able to recharge in 15 minutes. Anything less is not competitive with hybrids.

 

Free QC is a waste of time, any serious number of people using them and they'll have to start charging.

Really public charge stations in general are quite a myopic concept. Unless they are capable of recharging in under 10 minutes there could never be enough of them. Imagine the average gas station and how many pumps it would need if it filled at the same speed as a quick charge does now. Granted, people will top up at home, but the charge times need to be short.

Yeah... I just don't believe at all that with current EV tech where it is (mainly battery range), that even a mature network of charge stations will convince many people to bother.

Fast-Chargers are a very imperfect solution to a very serious problem. There are really just two problems with EVs now: They are expensive, and they don't go very far on a charge.

With better battery tech both of these numbers will become more attractive, and with subsequent generations of cars the price will go less as the range increases and more people will buy them. I certainly expect to be one of the first people I know to buy an EV, but at this time nothing quite cuts it for me.