Nissan Is Watching You — EV Charge Points Tracked and Shared

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EdmondLeaf

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Location
Edmond, OK
Finding somewhere to plug in an electric car can be a little difficult. Nissan has a solution to this potential problem. Leaf drivers know where to plug in their cars, so Nissan is just asking them.
Nissan’s new service, which went online April 23rd, monitors approximately 13,000 Leafs (in Japan) and records exactly where the cars are plugged in. The data is then sorted and put online for other Leaf drivers to access.

http://cleantechnica.com/2012/04/24/nissan-is-watching-you-ev-charge-points-tracked-and-shared/
I think this is great idea. They can easily filter your home evse out, however I am completely fine is someone want to use my home evse. IMHO this is the best way to do most updated evse map.
 
Yeah, hate the fact that the article title implies Orwellian monitoring. This is a GOOD thing! Sometimes people get so uptight about things that they don't understand. First of all it's very likely that no one will every track an individual car down to an individual charging station, but so what if they did? Most people willingly check in places on Facebook and they have to actually take actions to do so! But anyway, if it's that big a deal to some people, give them an opt-out (or even opt-in for the sane among us)--just don't give them the benefits of the system.

Anyway I agree, a well designed system should be able to distinguish public vs. private charging stations by simply asking the user whether it's public or private before it uploads the data. Simple as that. I do imagine there will be some that are misclassified unfortunately, but the system could probably sort that out by waiting until it received 2 or 3 reports of the same charging station. And maybe even display unconfirmed stations with a different color or icon to alert the driver.
 
Hopefully, Nissan would filter out locations where only a few cars charge. This would eliminate homes and businesses with private charging.
 
This is a good thing. If Nissan wants to sell Leaf's in Charlotte they're going to have to get more chargers in here. And I would LOVE :D to see QC's at every rest stop in NC to get me to Raleigh and back.
 
I have my home EVSE listed on Plug-Share and there are no other EVSEs for many miles in either direction. But so far no-one has ever asked to use it. I'm actually curious if anyone has ever actually used somebody else's home EVSE before off of PlugShare?
 
adric22 said:
I have my home EVSE listed on Plug-Share and there are no other EVSEs for many miles in either direction. But so far no-one has ever asked to use it. I'm actually curious if anyone has ever actually used somebody else's home EVSE before off of PlugShare?
I have and I am planning to.

In the prior instance, I have met the person I asked at an EV event so I felt comfortable asking him. I planned out my trip and sent him a message through plugshare. Unfortunately I did not hear back from him for about a week, 6 days after my trip!

In the future instance, there is an EV task force meeting taking place in June that's about 90 miles from my house. I'll need to stop en route, but once I get to the destination I'll certainly need to charge back up to 100%. There are no public charging stations nearby. The group organizing the meeting is working on getting temporary EVSEs to have at the meeting, but if that doesn't pan out I did see 2 nearby home charging stations on plugshare and I'll be reaching out to them to see if (a) they are interested in attending the meeting and (b) if they wouldn't mind if I charged at their home and I hitched a ride with them to the meeting!

My home charging station is listed in plugshare, but since it's only about 2 miles away from a Nissan dealer, I really doubt I'll ever get taken up on it.
 
coqui said:
And I would LOVE :D to see QC's at every rest stop in NC to get me to Raleigh and back.
That's not likely to happen. Too many legal issues surrounding the ability to charge $$$ for a charge at an interstate rest area and lack of infrastructure (i.e. 480V 3-phase power) at rest areas will prevent this. But that's not a bad thing. I really think siting the QC stations off-highway in areas with more amenities is going to work out better anyway. That is the direction OR and WA have taken and I think NC will follow their lead.
 
I got a plugshare request --

It was from a Volt.

My J1772 is effectively inside my house. I wasn't about to leave my house open for a guy to charge midday - he was up in my area on business - I figure he should have asked the business he was visiting for a charge - not camping out at my house (~3 miles from his location)

I delisted myself from plugshare. I might relist if they figure out how to add a "EV only Urgent Charge" option....
 
essaunders said:
I got a plugshare request --

It was from a Volt.

My J1772 is effectively inside my house. I wasn't about to leave my house open for a guy to charge midday - he was up in my area on business - I figure he should have asked the business he was visiting for a charge - not camping out at my house (~3 miles from his location)

I delisted myself from plugshare. I might relist if they figure out how to add a "EV only Urgent Charge" option....

"EV only Urgent Charge" you can put that in your description, but to me this is quite obvious that if you ask is either emergency or person is trying to do longer distance and planning in advance.
If I won't be comfortable with person and request to charge inside I will offer 120V plug outside
Maybe my situation here is different but in the land of limited no gas cars I am more than happy to meet and talk to other owners and treat request as opportunity to meet
We are back to QC infrastructure for longer trips and using L2 to get to QC
 
I figure he should have asked the business he was visiting for a charge

Maybe he asked and the business refused or does not have a 120 plug outside. Heck, my fortune 500 company refused.

If someone is driving a Volt or Leaf, highly unlikely he will be on the shady character list.
 
lpickup said:
Anyway I agree, a well designed system should be able to distinguish public vs. private charging stations by simply asking the user whether it's public or private before it uploads the data.
Nissan could simply filter any stations that aren't used my more than one Leaf as "private"' especially if those are repeatedly used by the same Leaf. Home chargers should be easy to spot.
 
EricH said:
Nissan could simply filter any stations that aren't used my more than one Leaf as "private"' especially if those are repeatedly used by the same Leaf. Home chargers should be easy to spot.
Once there are a fair number of LEAFs in an area. But you wouldn't want the public charger provided by the Haggis-N-Hustle restaurant to look like a "home charger" just because it's frequented by the first LEAF in town.

If the opportunity for a bidirectional data exchange capability through a conductor of the J1772 cable was squandered on just the single purpose (a "pilot tone", as I understand it) of advertising the max available current, it was a huge system design mistake. The EVSE should be able to ask for the car's VIN. Or ask the car for its "Amps-for-Champs" charging account ID. And the car should be able to ask the EVSE for its public/private classification.
 
EdmondLeaf said:
Finding somewhere to plug in an electric car can be a little difficult. Nissan has a solution to this potential problem. Leaf drivers know where to plug in their cars, so Nissan is just asking them.
Nissan’s new service, which went online April 23rd, monitors approximately 13,000 Leafs (in Japan) and records exactly where the cars are plugged in. The data is then sorted and put online for other Leaf drivers to access.

http://cleantechnica.com/2012/04/24/nissan-is-watching-you-ev-charge-points-tracked-and-shared/
I think this is great idea. They can easily filter your home evse out, however I am completely fine is someone want to use my home evse. IMHO this is the best way to do most updated evse map.


Does this mean that they know when I am getting charged up at Deja-Vue in Nashville's Titty-Bar Strip?
 
CWO4Mann said:
Does this mean that they know when I am getting charged up at Deja-Vue in Nashville's Titty-Bar Strip?
For sure they know, but that is the information I need too. How many chargers they have there?
 
EdmondLeaf said:
CWO4Mann said:
Does this mean that they know when I am getting charged up at Deja-Vue in Nashville's Titty-Bar Strip?
For sure they know, but that is the information I need too. How many chargers they have there?

Haha, having met Dave, I think he's talking about a different kind of "charged-up." And I'm pretty sure the Deja-Vu in Nashville doesn't have EVSEs... but if they do, maybe I need to take a trip with Dave next time!
 
essaunders said:
My J1772 is effectively inside my house. I wasn't about to leave my house open for a guy to charge midday - he was up in my area on business - I figure he should have asked the business he was visiting for a charge - not camping out at my house (~3 miles from his location)

I delisted myself from plugshare. I might relist if they figure out how to add a "EV only Urgent Charge" option....

This is basically why I "delisted" myself from PlugShare recently as well: I wasn't willing to give someone access to my house/garage, so why should I advertise as such?
At first--when there was no ChargePoint or Blink--PlugShare was a neat way to seek out (early) EV adopters. Now, it just becomes a security risk (even when your contact info isn't visible, they can find you via GPS) and I'm not sure it has much of a future.
 
Stanton said:
At first--when there was no ChargePoint or Blink--PlugShare was a neat way to seek out (early) EV adopters. Now, it just becomes a security risk (even when your contact info isn't visible, they can find you via GPS) and I'm not sure it has much of a future.
We still waiting for first official OK delivery probably May 18, so still early adopters. IMHO there is desperate need to have accurate inventory of public chargers from one source and Nissan is best suited to deliver that. As of private locations or of limits to general public that is completely different story and up to the owner to decide if they want to be included.
 
Stanton said:
Now, it just becomes a security risk (even when your contact info isn't visible, they can find you via GPS) and I'm not sure it has much of a future.
yeh, you want to be careful with this... we had an charging app in the UK (Plugsurfing) that took private data from a members only database (EV Network) and published it!

Security Breach: iPhone App Releases Private Data of Electric Car Owners

http://www.greencarreports.com/news...-releases-private-data-of-electric-car-owners
 
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