PiP and the Future of Home Charging

Where are you getting 200 Amps? A lot of homes don't even have a 200 amp service for the whole house?? Nevermind 200 amps for a charger.

 

I already have two 220v outlets on separate breakers. One is rated 30 amps and one is 20 amps. I could easily add a third one if I wanted to. With two plug-in cars, you just need 60 amps total. And if you time the chargers right, you could start charging one car first and then charge the second one after.

 

You should be more concern of the battery technology than home charging. One of the reasons why pure EV's aren't that popular is because the battery's cost/performance is too high. In fact, even PiP isn't that popular compared to hybrids when you look at it as in the entire country.

 

I thought the OpenEVSE guys were working on something like this.. but ideally, if I had a Tesla and a PiP, I'd want a charger than can charge up to, say 90A (which would be awesome for the Tesla).. or whatever your existing system can handle. But have two J1772 handles.. and if I had the PiP plugged in, then the available amperage for the 2nd J1772 handle would be limited accordingly. Then you wouldnt need to worry about upgrading your home's electrical service or adding a new panel or something.

Although as you mentioned, in the future, you may have 2 cars that can handle a total of 200A, its highly unlikely BOTH cars would need to charge overnight at full capacity.

 

I personally don't think this subject can be brought up without talking about a few other things...

If people really have 100 mile commutes.....number one, should they be using an EV; and number two, that is their fault for living that far away from their job.

If EV usage really goes that widespread will it drop the price of gasoline causing an equilibrium of sorts for decades into the future with both gasoline and electricity being used?

 

I'm shaking my head at that one.

 

It's a matter of economics and environmentalism (and time-onomics). Why would someone give up that much time on the road, money to travel costs, and all the harm to the environment that much travel causes when they can simply move a little closer and have none of those issues?

 

This shouldn't be any more complicated than the original retrofit of electricity to houses that were built before electricity was locally available. E.g. the house I grew up in. Dad remembers it arriving when he was a teenager. I remember a couple upgrades.

If the market exists, users will adapt, though it may cost some money.

 

Yet another reason I love living in the midwest. None, or very little, traffic issues. Most schools are pretty decent. And homes are affordable. We just have to put up with about 2 or 3 months of some not so great weather.

fwiw I do like California...great place to visit.

 

Most new homes have 200 amp service...lots of older ones only 100 amps. I don't see the need for charging at home with a large Tesla-like supercharger. The average person drives about 12-15K miles per year...even if you assume none of that is on long road trips, that is only a max of ~40 miles per day. Even if you assume just 250 driving days per year that is only 60 miles per day. With the PIP L1 charging rate that takes 10 hours to charge. L2 is about 5 hours. Go to some special 50 amp charger and you can do it in an hour. Do you really need faster than an hour per car each day at home?

Sure, on a road trip an hour is a long time...but plugged in overnight...no big deal. But the cost would be a big deal considering you'd have to rewire the whole breaker box, bring in 440v instead of 220v, rewire the whole neighborhood distribution system up on poles or in the ground. The cost would be too high.

Tesla is selling cars to rich people. Even they haven't proposed selling a supercharger for home use.

Mike

 

I think I would be happy (with a PiP and) with Level 1 at home, in fact I wish I could opt for even half the power draw on the overnight charge up to be kind and gentle on the home wiring.

 

I think you're being naive and uncaring.
- A lot of households have and depend on two incomes, which makes it hard to find the perfect location. (My wife and I work in opposite directions, but fortunately it's only a total of 24-27 miles apart; it used to be closer to 40 miles*).
- Job stability is low so the right place can very easily turn into the wrong place.
- In many locations the price of housing is so high that the economics push people to very long commutes.

If I'm critical of anything it's of people sprawling away from cities into large houses on large plots of land, land which they spend hours each week trying to make as perfectly unproductive as they can.

Fortunately people are turning away from the modern distant suburbia and moving back into the city or city suburbs. However, that doesn't mean the labor market won't dictate longer commutes.

* Before that it was over 3,000 miles but then I got my visa.

 

No, not happening. Conservatively, 1kW is 2 miles per hour. 40kW is 80 miles per hour. I really pity the household that needs that much charging.

Installations for 80A HPWCs are several thousand dollars, but most people really don't need that and many Tesla Model S owners aren't bothering. Cars are idle most of the time, so unless you have an extreme commute, even with 6 hours of L2 a car could accumulate range during a week.

 

Sometimes you need to accept the reality, although you want everything to be ideal. For me, i work at different locations. One is 5 miles away, the other is 20 miles away, the longest is about 40 miles away. I wish I could buy houses right next to each work place. Maybe when I win lottery. Especially in CA, even a short trip can become a longest trip ever.

My friend just found a new job, which is also 40 miles away from his house. But the houses in that area are all million dollar houses. Therefore, my friend decides to make long commute everyday.

 

It's not a matter of complication but entirely a matter of expense. The only complications arise when trying to find shortcuts in following all the required electrical codes. If you want 200 Amps service to charge a fleet of EVs, there would be dozens of electrical contractors after that high margin business. Some serious copper is involved and that is one expensive metal.

Now 200 Amps is way too large for just two cars as shown in other posts. It can be done, but the money would be much better spent getting a smart charger setup that makes dual use of a 40 Amp feed. (I don't refuel my gas car like in a NASCAR pit stop, and I would not want to supercharge my EV for essentially the same reason.)

 

I never said I had any problem with 10-30 mile commutes. Above that it's a little gray. And above 70 miles is just downright stupid (one way, everyday).

Also, there are a lot of homes in our area that are being built with 150 amp service and even a few little ones that still get 100 amp.