Are DC chargers getting too fast?
Discussion
OK the answer is no but with 350+kw chargers coming and vehicles capable to taking advantage not far behind we're going to be looking at a 20-90% time of under 10 minutes.
so what's the problem?
Utilization, pull up and connect then you go inside for a toilet break and buy a coffee or some food and sit down to eat, the car finishes charging well before you have and the charger is left tied up for others.
people are selfish, they are not going to sit in the car for 10 minutes then move it somewhere else to go inside and take a break.
so what's the problem?
Utilization, pull up and connect then you go inside for a toilet break and buy a coffee or some food and sit down to eat, the car finishes charging well before you have and the charger is left tied up for others.
people are selfish, they are not going to sit in the car for 10 minutes then move it somewhere else to go inside and take a break.
Having not yet ventured in to the world of EVs I admit this may already exist but... Surely charges could be set to unlock once the car is fully charged and another person could then use it? Obviously this would mean two parking spaces per charger but it doesn't seem the most illogical approach IMO.
It's going to be very difficult to deploy chargers pulling hundreds of kilowatts each because no one will want to pay for the grid upgrades that will be necessary for most sites.
At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
paulrockliffe said:
It's going to be very difficult to deploy chargers pulling hundreds of kilowatts each because no one will want to pay for the grid upgrades that will be necessary for most sites.
At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
that' could be OK except based on current charging models they charge you based on theoretical speed of each charger rather than the actual charging speed. One solution to this is to specify a variety of charging speeds which could be electable either on the device or havechargers with different rates available.At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
You'd be rather upset if you were being charged based on 350KW charging but only actually charging at 50KW.
I agree that charging in a minute like a petrol pump would be fantastic but it not going to happen within my lifetime if it ever does.
Tesla has a £10 overstay fine, which is usually for 10 minutes after charging has completed OR if the land owner has put a time limit on charging.
Regarding comments of grid etc, 350KW means that most people are only on the charger for 15 minutes. So less long term connected cars and more short term boosts. This is why you are starting to see Tesla Mega packs (battery )being mounted near charging stations. They take the hit during heavy demands when they balance the load, then recharge after the peak time has ended.
Fast charging in less time than is possible to fill a petrol/diesel car is likely to happen in our life time. 350KW chargers are currently available, 500KW (or half a Megawatt!) chargers are on the way.
Solid state batteries are cited as being production ready in Toyota cars from 2028. These allegedly charge in 5 minutes. Electric cars may or may not be the future, but for battery only vehicles (BEV's) then it's too early to say yet.
I've owned EV's since 2012 with a car that took a whole night to charge and only gave 55 miles range (Renault Fluenze) and 4 EV's later I have a Model 3LR. Since I bought the Tesla in 2020, they have already upgraded the chargers from 250KW to 350KW.. the most I have ever waited for was 22 minutes and the longest I've ever queued for a Tesla charger was 5 minutes (yesterday!) and then after 19 minutes I was on my way again. You do want charging to be either lightning fast (rapid DC) or leave the car on a Destination charger (7-22KW AC) and it will be ready in 3-5 hours.
Regarding comments of grid etc, 350KW means that most people are only on the charger for 15 minutes. So less long term connected cars and more short term boosts. This is why you are starting to see Tesla Mega packs (battery )being mounted near charging stations. They take the hit during heavy demands when they balance the load, then recharge after the peak time has ended.
Fast charging in less time than is possible to fill a petrol/diesel car is likely to happen in our life time. 350KW chargers are currently available, 500KW (or half a Megawatt!) chargers are on the way.
Solid state batteries are cited as being production ready in Toyota cars from 2028. These allegedly charge in 5 minutes. Electric cars may or may not be the future, but for battery only vehicles (BEV's) then it's too early to say yet.
I've owned EV's since 2012 with a car that took a whole night to charge and only gave 55 miles range (Renault Fluenze) and 4 EV's later I have a Model 3LR. Since I bought the Tesla in 2020, they have already upgraded the chargers from 250KW to 350KW.. the most I have ever waited for was 22 minutes and the longest I've ever queued for a Tesla charger was 5 minutes (yesterday!) and then after 19 minutes I was on my way again. You do want charging to be either lightning fast (rapid DC) or leave the car on a Destination charger (7-22KW AC) and it will be ready in 3-5 hours.
Edited by LordFlathead on Wednesday 8th February 15:39
LordFlathead said:
Tesla has a £10 overstay fine, which is usually for 10 minutes after charging has completed
It can be a lot more than that. It’s an unlimited fee. 50p per minute overstay if 50% or more chargers are in use, or £1 a minute if 100% of chargers in use. Starts as soon as you’re fully charged and has no upper limit. https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/support/supercharger-i...
And all rapid charge providers should do exactly the same.
CheesecakeRunner said:
It can be a lot more than that. It’s an unlimited fee. 50p per minute overstay if 50% or more chargers are in use, or £1 a minute if 100% of chargers in use. Starts as soon as you’re fully charged and has no upper limit.
https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/support/supercharger-i...
And all rapid charge providers should do exactly the same.
Yes, was speaking from personal experience when I got the car I wasn't prepared for how fast it charged. https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/support/supercharger-i...
And all rapid charge providers should do exactly the same.
Any Rapid DC charger should have severe over-stay charges else it defeats the point of having them
CheesecakeRunner said:
It can be a lot more than that. It’s an unlimited fee. 50p per minute overstay if 50% or more chargers are in use, or £1 a minute if 100% of chargers in use. Starts as soon as you’re fully charged and has no upper limit.
https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/support/supercharger-i...
And all rapid charge providers should do exactly the same.
I wonder if a more effective deterrent would be that once charge has hit 100% it immediately starts to work in reverse, and drains the battery, say 1% per minute.https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/support/supercharger-i...
And all rapid charge providers should do exactly the same.
EmailAddress said:
I watched a group park in the pickup bays outside McDonald's the other day, for the delivery drivers and pre-order collection.
Very busy. Only five spaces. Much turnover and checking back of other cars.
They had their food delivered and then sat there. For twenty minutes. Eating. With a massive estate carpark within sight.
Lord knows how the entitled will f
k up charging. It's annoying enough currently.
Would they be entitled to go to someone else's car park to eat their 'food'?Very busy. Only five spaces. Much turnover and checking back of other cars.
They had their food delivered and then sat there. For twenty minutes. Eating. With a massive estate carpark within sight.
Lord knows how the entitled will f
k up charging. It's annoying enough currently.paulrockliffe said:
It's going to be very difficult to deploy chargers pulling hundreds of kilowatts each because no one will want to pay for the grid upgrades that will be necessary for most sites.
At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
There's a lot of work going on with battery-backed chargers, allowing higher speeds without the grid upgrades. Lots of issues with it, but may be the future.At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
Order66 said:
paulrockliffe said:
It's going to be very difficult to deploy chargers pulling hundreds of kilowatts each because no one will want to pay for the grid upgrades that will be necessary for most sites.
At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
There's a lot of work going on with battery-backed chargers, allowing higher speeds without the grid upgrades. Lots of issues with it, but may be the future.At those outputs the chargers would have to be rate-limited by site capacity generally, so if your car is full and you're still having your coffee there will simply be more current available at the other chargers, which will go from charging at 10% of capacity to charging at 11%.
A charging site with 10 x 100kW chargers would be a megawatt.
That's equivalent to the peak load of a couple of hundred houses or something?
If there's enough users to keep it busy, then paying for it is not such a problem.
If there's only a few users at peak times, then you need a lot of battery capacity if the mains can't cope,
Say you were serving 30 cars in a two hour peak time slot, you'd need the battery capacity of 30 cars.
You'd have to get your money back over a few years of 5 days a week perhaps?
Say you had 200kWh of battery, costing £40k, and each car took 20kWh.
If it served 10 cars a day, 250 days a year, payback in 2 years, that would add about £8 to a premium rate charge?
Will the market bear that?
It probably should do.
We seem to have muddled our way into a world where EV drivers expect the infrastructure to be paid for by someone else?
Order66 said:
There's a lot of work going on with battery-backed chargers, allowing higher speeds without the grid upgrades. Lots of issues with it, but may be the future.
Lots of work as in fitting more of the ones that exist now?Gridserve forecourt or the more recent BP units that look like that have TVS.
OutInTheShed said:
I would have thought that if people really want very fast charging, they'd be happy to pay for it.
A charging site with 10 x 100kW chargers would be a megawatt.
That's equivalent to the peak load of a couple of hundred houses or something?
If there's enough users to keep it busy, then paying for it is not such a problem.
If there's only a few users at peak times, then you need a lot of battery capacity if the mains can't cope,
Say you were serving 30 cars in a two hour peak time slot, you'd need the battery capacity of 30 cars.
You'd have to get your money back over a few years of 5 days a week perhaps?
Say you had 200kWh of battery, costing £40k, and each car took 20kWh.
If it served 10 cars a day, 250 days a year, payback in 2 years, that would add about £8 to a premium rate charge?
Will the market bear that?
It probably should do.
We seem to have muddled our way into a world where EV drivers expect the infrastructure to be paid for by someone else?
I suspect that for high speed DC charging that extra 40p per KWh is about what the market will stand as a premium over domestic rates; more than that smacks of coining it in.A charging site with 10 x 100kW chargers would be a megawatt.
That's equivalent to the peak load of a couple of hundred houses or something?
If there's enough users to keep it busy, then paying for it is not such a problem.
If there's only a few users at peak times, then you need a lot of battery capacity if the mains can't cope,
Say you were serving 30 cars in a two hour peak time slot, you'd need the battery capacity of 30 cars.
You'd have to get your money back over a few years of 5 days a week perhaps?
Say you had 200kWh of battery, costing £40k, and each car took 20kWh.
If it served 10 cars a day, 250 days a year, payback in 2 years, that would add about £8 to a premium rate charge?
Will the market bear that?
It probably should do.
We seem to have muddled our way into a world where EV drivers expect the infrastructure to be paid for by someone else?
Don't forget that the vast majority of people will seldom or never need to rapid charge.
I've driven 9000 miles in 11 months in my MG5 LR and only rapid charged once.
The longest journey being 202 miles in one day (back with 16% left), not too many people will regularly do this distance.
The time I did charge was a drive to Newcastle (135 miles away) and back
Rapid charged on the way home, but only for the kWh needed.
I think what is key, is that batteries are now a sufficient size to minimise the need to charge on the road, this will also improve.
Also drivers don't work out what charge they need so stay plugged in longer than needed, which is also expensive compared to home charging.
I've driven 9000 miles in 11 months in my MG5 LR and only rapid charged once.
The longest journey being 202 miles in one day (back with 16% left), not too many people will regularly do this distance.
The time I did charge was a drive to Newcastle (135 miles away) and back
Rapid charged on the way home, but only for the kWh needed.
I think what is key, is that batteries are now a sufficient size to minimise the need to charge on the road, this will also improve.
Also drivers don't work out what charge they need so stay plugged in longer than needed, which is also expensive compared to home charging.
Most cars are unable to utilise all 350kw that is on offer. I stopped at one the other day with my car at 75% Plugged in and went for a brew. It took 30 mins to add 22 kWh. It maxed out at around 80kw. Last time I was at the same chargers the best car was a Taycan which was pulling 125kw and the worst an id at 45kw.
moonigan said:
Most cars are unable to utilise all 350kw that is on offer. I stopped at one the other day with my car at 75% Plugged in and went for a brew. It took 30 mins to add 22 kWh. It maxed out at around 80kw.
Oh jeez. What a plonker, Rodney.As with most new things, it's not the technology, it's the user.
If you plugged in to a rapid charger at 75% state-of-charge, you didn't need to use a rapid charger at all. Hard-of-thinking people like this will be the downfall of the public charging network, as during your 30 minutes of brew drinking you might have denied someone who needed to use a rapid charger a potential spot.
I can't think of a situation where you'd need to plug in at 75%, and your post doesn't read like you're trolling, either.
C.A.R. said:
moonigan said:
Most cars are unable to utilise all 350kw that is on offer. I stopped at one the other day with my car at 75% Plugged in and went for a brew. It took 30 mins to add 22 kWh. It maxed out at around 80kw.
Oh jeez. What a plonker, Rodney.As with most new things, it's not the technology, it's the user.
If you plugged in to a rapid charger at 75% state-of-charge, you didn't need to use a rapid charger at all. Hard-of-thinking people like this will be the downfall of the public charging network, as during your 30 minutes of brew drinking you might have denied someone who needed to use a rapid charger a potential spot.
I can't think of a situation where you'd need to plug in at 75%, and your post doesn't read like you're trolling, either.
Here's a graphic illustrating how SOC affects charging rates in a Porsche Taycan. At 75% you'll get 85kW at best and the rate will keep dropping until full.
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