Charging infrastructure is not growing

[tcherniaev]

I know that for those who live in California, or Tennessee, or Washington/Oregon this may seem like an incorrect statement. But I live in Utah (30 miles South of Salt Lake City), and there has been no growth in charging infrastructure. About 8 months ago a bunch of Walgreens installed chargers but that is all we have here.

If fact, it is getting worse. I used to be able to use chargers at the Nissan dealerships. But with the recent lease deals, every dealer in the area sold Leafs to their employees, so now they occupy all chargers. It appears that since dealer gives away power for free, they simply wait until they get to work and then charge for 5+ hours at a time. Great for them, sucks for me.

When I purchased my Leaf a year ago, I did so with expectations that charging infrastructure will grow relatively quickly. But that simply did not happen. I called the city of Salt Lake, and they have no plans for charging infrastructure. There is a new mall that just opened downtown, and they did not install any chargers. Park City would be a great destination for Leaf owners -- easy round trip from most of Salt Lake valley if you could just charge while having dinner/shopping/skiing. But there are no chargers in Park City.

If not for Walgreens, I would not have ANY reasonable expectations to be able to charge away from home. But let's face it, even though I am very grateful to Walgreens, their parking lots are not the best places for charging. Malls, restaurants, movie theaters would be a much better places to charge.

So for all you EV drivers on the West cast and in other EV-friendly states, I envy you.

 

[ksnogas2112]

It will get better. There were 20 in town (KC Metro) when I bought my Leaf in June and there's almost 50 now.

 

[GetOffYourGas]

Infrastructure is growing, just not everywhere. And not as fast as EV drivers would like! Keep pushing. If businesses / cities / etc. don't know there's a demand for chargers, they won't install them.

I've made it a hobby of mine to petition good destinations for chargers. For example, halfway between Syracuse and Rochester, there is a shopping outlet center (Waterloo, NY). This would be a perfect spot for EVSEs since it serves visitors from two majors cities. I keep pushing them. They have 120V outlets available, but that's painfully slow.

 

[adric22]

I feel your pain. My entire county only has about 14 stations. 5 of those I cannot use because they require a $40 monthly subscription that I'll never pay for since I don't need it that badly. the remaining 9 are in places that I rarely go.

I bought my leaf almost 2 years ago and I have also been disappointed at the growth of charging infrastructure. I would imagine, however, some of it may have to do with the slow sales of cars that can actually use them.

 

[thedak]

Pittsburgh ain't great

 

[Leon]

Ouch. Funny thing, if there was any market penetration of EV's, any infrastructure short of "ubiquitous" will be unreliable. You need range excess. Period. When you drive a Tesla with a real 250 mile range, you won't be afraid to drive across the metroplex. With 27,000 miles and counting, I will NOT buy another EV without a battery up to my "desire". The idea that the manufacture decides what you "need", and then complains when sales aren't what they want... Well, make it an option commensurate with the price and see what happens..... I paid 35K for a car that "just" meets my range requirement. If I drive to work and the power is out, I'm not getting home. Seriously, another 5K wouldn't have stopped me from buying the car. I still LOVE this car. I can't wait to trade it in on an EV with real range.... and a little more insulation around the wheel wells. I've ridden in a Model S and I'm ready.

 

[pchilds]

I live in SoCal and there are only 5 public EVSE locations within 20 miles of my house, 2 of them are Nissan dealers.

 

[Herm]

I feel your pain. My entire county only has about 14 stations. 5 of those I cannot use because they require a $40 monthly subscription that I'll never pay for since I don't need it that badly. the remaining 9 are in places that I rarely go.

I bought my leaf almost 2 years ago and I have also been disappointed at the growth of charging infrastructure. I would imagine, however, some of it may have to do with the slow sales of cars that can actually use them.

You are dissapointed at the rate of growth of free charging infrastructure...

 

[ksnogas2112]

Around here the problem is more of lack of appropriately placed infrastructure is not growing.

Places that are/would be good spots:
Malls, movie theaters, grocery stores, DMV, airport, head of biking trails, libraries, community college

Places that are not good spots for public but might be good for employees:
Harley Davidson plant, City Hall(s), county offices that aren't near anything, anything behind a locked gate

 

[dgpcolorado]

I feel your pain. My entire county only has about 14 stations. 5 of those I cannot use because they require a $40 monthly subscription that I'll never pay for since I don't need it that badly. the remaining 9 are in places that I rarely go.

I bought my leaf almost 2 years ago and I have also been disappointed at the growth of charging infrastructure. I would imagine, however, some of it may have to do with the slow sales of cars that can actually use them.

Fourteen charge stations sounds like a lot to me: my county, and the six adjacent counties, have zero charge stations. Not much point in building them until there are a lot of EVs. But few people will be willing to accept the limited range of EVs unless there are charge stations as a "security blanket". It's the usual "chicken and egg" problem.

My local power co-op is pretty progressive and is seriously considering charge stations, so some may appear here someday. But my LEAF works just fine with home charging.

 

[Stanton]

Public EVSE's will continue to vary widely by city/region.
Here in Dallas, it's actually to the point now where I can find a FREE EVSE in a pinch. Of course, there are many more that AREN'T free, but I'm not ever desperate enough (yet) to pay for charging.

 

[philipscoggins]

Tennessee got a big Ecotality push (as in DCQC every 30 miles along the interstates & reimbursements for businesses installing level 2 stations) but from what I understand that money is gone. I probably wouldn't own a LEAF if we didn't have the DCQCs along the interstate, because I drive too much & I want an EV that can be my 99.9% car. I'm very thankful for what we've got!

But I see it's expansion slowing unless Nissan has a push coming like they've implied. I do see some Blink stations showing up at businesses in larger cities, but I think they are from LEAF owners who are "doing their part" to make their business a place for fellow EV folk to meet.

Philip

 

[KJD]

I know that for those who live in California, or Tennessee, or Washington/Oregon this may seem like an incorrect statement. But I live in Utah (30 miles South of Salt Lake City), and there has been no growth in charging infrastructure. About 8 months ago a bunch of Walgreens installed chargers but that is all we have here.

I would have to agree, there just are not enough public access charge stations here in Utah.
Here is a picture of my car the the charge station at Liberty Park. A 120 volt outlet.


I have talked to Jill Remington Love ( SLC council person ) about upgrading this station to a level 2. It is supposed to be in next years budget.

 

[mazdaboi]

Public Charging infrastructure in the DC Metro area is about 1 station per month (plugshare.com) and private is around 2 per month (also plugshare.com)

Not as quick as we would like to see, but i do stay frequent on Twitter with suggestions to the companies and have recieved replies back with them looking to push their advertising/sales teams contacting the suggested sites/business'.


Atleast it seems like they are...trying?

 

[thait84]

All the charging stations at the places i go to in LA are always taken. I will basically only go somewhere with the assumption that I can't get a charge.

 

[Wolfram]

Things in the LA area aren't great for the time being. There are what, 3 or 4 DCQC stations in the entire LA-OC-Riverside metro area? I've contacted management at Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga about getting some L2 chargers, but they haven't responded. I also contacted The Shoppes at Chino Hills, and they are considering adding another L2.

 

[GaslessInSeattle]

If EV's were selling like hot cakes, I think we'd see more momentum for charging infrastructure. then again, what we really need is bigger batteries. have you considered adding L2 at work?

 

[GetOffYourGas]

If EV's were selling like hot cakes, I think we'd see more momentum for charging infrastructure. then again, what we really need is bigger batteries. have you considered adding L2 at work?

I think if there were more momentum for charging infrastructures (especially at work places), EVs would be selling like hot cakes.

Then again, hot cakes don't really sell well either. Too much competition from the milk-industry supported cereals.

 

[nosuchthing]

+1

I have never charged anywhere other than home. There are just too few places in Marin to be chasing and hoping they are available. I think that the amount of time the car has to sit charging is a fatal flaw, even if we had 10 times more chargers than we have now.

I charged L1 at my job for 3 months when I got the car until the administrator found out and unceremoniously had me written up for "stealing hospital resources" and as a result the car is now my wife's. I only get to drive it on days off. I had my boss change the wording, so they agreed that if I "countinued to charge" I would be thieving hospital resources, but not before that. Very funny. I did pay for all the juice at a cost of 60 cents per day as was always my intention. Took months to get the price per kW form the chief engineer.

I have written this person a letter and received a reply. The end result was a no-go.

I can't wait posting this letter in its entirety as soon as the person or I am retired from the place. This is a corporation to whom forward-looking means 4 inches in front or their nose.

:shock: :?

 

[richard]

So for all you EV drivers on the West cast and in other EV-friendly states, I envy you.

Reminds me of William Gibson's quote:

The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed.