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submitted 1 year ago by boem@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[-] Fridgeratr@lemmy.world 79 points 1 year ago

At a charger, probably. I'm no expert though.

[-] sizzler@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago

Someone doesn't know what British (European) streets are like.

[-] Joelk111@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago

I don't need to. Is there a way to charge EVs there? Then EVs will likely be charged there. Is there not a way to charge EVs there? Then EVs probably won't be charged there.

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[-] WHYAREWEALLCAPS@kbin.social 64 points 1 year ago

This is the same problem ICE cars faced when they were rolled out. It isn't like there was a gas station on every corner when the Model T rolled out. As more and more EVs hit the road, charging availability will increase until we reach a point where chargers are ubiquitous. It may reach the point where every parking space has a charger.

This is a transitional issue that will resolve itself.

[-] BastingChemina@slrpnk.net 29 points 1 year ago

It is also way easier to install a charging station than a gas station.

Electricity is already available everywhere.

[-] Landmammals@lemmy.world 22 points 1 year ago

Installing wires is too difficult. Let's just continue doing it the easy way, pumping liquid dinosaurs out of the ground and transporting flammable liquid thousands of miles.

[-] Chriswild@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago

Gasoline has about a 6 month self life and has to be refined from crude oil at specific facilities that polute the surrounding area.

The supply chain to support gasoline is completely insane compared to plugging you car in at home 90% of the time. Once the wiring is updated to support EVs it's basically done, no more logistics expense but gas is expensive always.

[-] Landmammals@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

Yeah that's the point. Saying it's too hard to upgrade wiring is madness.

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[-] r00ty@kbin.life 18 points 1 year ago

Except it's not the same, yet. Currently in the space you can have a fuel station cars can refuel in 5 minutes to full and be on their way making that pump available.

EVs need at least 30 minutes with the fastest charger to get from say 20 to 60 right? In either case they take up the bay. So you need to be able to handle many more at once.

If all bays are fast charge, that's a lot of power infrastructure required.

Now, all isn't lost. There's more ways to charge an EV. For example people can mostly charge at home, there could be ways to charge on the move (I don't wonder what kind of drag would be applied charging with induction) and then, yes charging points which we'd hope are used less often.

But the issue is the promises of X things done by Y year. Since there's just not been enough work done until now.

[-] roscoe@startrek.website 14 points 1 year ago

The footprints of chargers and gas stations aren't the same though. A lot of places I go have a row of 8-10 spots with chargers. No added footprint really, just installed at the front of the spot. Compare that to an 8-10 pump gas station, even without a convenience store. If you removed a gas station and replaced it with rows of spaces with chargers I think you'd get more cars through over a given period of time.

[-] Yaztromo@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago

EVs need at least 30 minutes with the fastest charger to get from say 20 to 60 right? In either case they take up the bay. So you need to be able to handle many more at once.

No. The Hyundai IONIQ 5 and 6 (and likely 7) only need 18 minutes to go from 10% to 80%.

[-] ExLisper@linux.community 6 points 1 year ago

But I can charge my EV at home so I only use public chargers like once every couple months instead of refilling exclusively at the gas stations. I also see a lot of people paying small amounts at the gas station (like 10-20 euros) so I'm guessing they visit them once per week. I have no idea how this impacts the overall occupancy rate but my guess is that a lot of city cars will not use public chargers at all so it's not like we're moving all cars for gas stations to charging stations.

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[-] jenny_ball@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

those fast chargers require huge infrastructure to scale out. 480v service.

[-] Riven@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 year ago

That's what I always tell people too, I'm just meaner about it. I also tell them to go back to horses.

[-] athos77@kbin.social 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

But where will my horses find water to drink and hay to eat when we go to town?!?

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[-] tonyn@lemmy.ml 26 points 1 year ago

Not looking forward to sidewalks and curbs covered in a tangle of car charger cables.

[-] Nusm@lemmy.zip 13 points 1 year ago

A tangle of cables? I’ll feel right at home! …and right at work! 🤣

[-] Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

It would be nice if more manufacturers would put multiple charge ports on cars. Most only have one. And I don’t think anyone is doing more than 2.

Having one on each corner would be dope and would reduce the length of cord that often needs to be run.

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[-] partial_accumen@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Tesla is developing a wireless charger. So these could be embedded in the street negating the need for cords.

[-] SpaceMan9000@lemmy.world 18 points 1 year ago

Ah yes, just fuck up streets and waste a fuckton of energy due to wireless charging

[-] partial_accumen@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Ah yes, just fuck up streets and waste a fuckton of energy due to wireless charging

I am assuming you're assuming inefficiencies in wireless charging over wired charging. One provider looking at this technology finds wired and wireless VERY close to one another in efficiency, with wireless possibly being even MORE efficient.

"Wireless charging for EVs is considered as efficient and fast as charging with a plug. For example, most EV plugs have 80-95 percent efficiency ratings. According to WiTricity, a leading provider, their wireless EV chargers achieve 90-93 percent efficiency. " source

[-] Riven@lemmy.dbzer0.com 12 points 1 year ago

I would be interested in that if done by anyone else than elon. I wouldn't put it past them to have made that proposal to kill public transit or something else. Like they already did with the dumb tunnel that was canceled now.

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[-] GadgeteerZA@fedia.io 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

@boem@lemmy.world home owners would certainly charge their EVs at home, so the issue really is for those in apartment blocks. By us most apartment blocks have reserved/paid bays, so I'd imagine it must be possible to fit pop-up type chargers? I'd expect apartment blocks would have to make a plan of sorts to meet car owners halfway. After all, if you buy/rent any apartment today, it normally has electricity wired (and water piped, and often Internet connected) to the unit. Why not the same for a parking bay?

[-] Dremor@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago

At home? Not like we are lacking electric outlets.

[-] Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 21 points 1 year ago

The problem is apartments without garages or without parking lots. See San Francisco, New York, etc.

[-] laurelraven 10 points 1 year ago

My understanding is that most people like that in those cities don't have cars because mass transit there is actually quite good, and keeping a car is excessively expensive for something they'll rarely need

[-] TheDarksteel94@sopuli.xyz 4 points 1 year ago

Things work differently in the US lol

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[-] WHYAREWEALLCAPS@kbin.social 7 points 1 year ago

As electric car ownership increases, apartments will be incentivized to install ways to charge them. Just like electric cars it'll start with high end apartments and trickle down. This may also incentivize apartment owners to install solar on their buildings to charge battery banks to save money on electricity.

[-] Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago

Problem is that these places often don’t have available street parking in front of the building. It’s a public street, and someone that lives in different building often grabs the open spot. And in addition to that, buildings almost always have more cars than spots in front of them.

Sure, the building owner could put chargers in front of their property, but in a place like SF, the residents will rarely get access to them.

Charging infrastructure needs to be lead by the city, state, or federal government. Putting it on landlords won’t do anything.

Also, landlords in these places already barely maintain their units. Many of them wouldn’t even maintain the HVAC until laws forced them to. And even now, many drag their feet.

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[-] TheDarksteel94@sopuli.xyz 3 points 1 year ago

Yeah, go on and charge an EV with your slow standard wall plug.

[-] iluminae@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago

Did this for 3 years with a daily commute to a different state - ~13h of charging a day on 120v was far more than enough. Obviously I'm lucky enough to have a outdoor plug available to the car area but if you do it's completely doable.

[-] Kit 4 points 1 year ago

Same. I got about 2 miles of range per hour of charging on 120V, and my office was only 9 miles away. Easy peasy.

[-] bamboo@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago

Even that seems low unless it’s a giant truck, my Chevy volt can charge at like 4mph on 120V, and I think I have the charging rate reduced to not test my house’s 60 year old wiring.

[-] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

I know what you mean but it's pretty funny to read charging in terms of mph.

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[-] WHYAREWEALLCAPS@kbin.social 8 points 1 year ago

It's trivial to get a 240v circuit installed, even an electrician apprentice can do it with their eyes closed. Alternatively, you can install a battery bank that discharges at >120v while being plugged into a 120v circuit.

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[-] Dremor@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

Unless you use most of the charge during the same day, it is quite doable.
Sure the charge is slow, but you can plug it in the evening and let it charge during the night, like you'd do for a smartphone.
Depending on the capacity you may not get a full charge, but it is enough for most uses. If it charges enough for what you'll do during the day, it isn't a problem at all.

[-] qyron@sopuli.xyz 14 points 1 year ago

Not an exotheric notion.

Besides special purpose built charging spots, available in the streets, my country is incentivizing the instalation of charging spots in supermarkets, shopping malls and regular gas stations.

Residential buildings have incentives to install charging spots and I've read that new construction has to have it by default.

It is doable. In extremis, regular street light posts can be retrofitted with the necessary hardware.

[-] fhqwgads@possumpat.io 11 points 1 year ago

I would love to see chargers more incentivized at workplaces. As solar becomes more common charging during the day is going to make more sense than night. There are already ways to track charging costs and bill them out or just consider it a job perk. Most people don't need to charge 300 miles a day so even if every single employee drives an EV you probably only need to install enough chargers for somewhere like ¼ of the cars on site. Yes some people need to drive for work, but there are a lot of cars that sit all day and could be running on solar instead of charging off something else at night instead.

[-] doppelgangmember@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago

Convert the Office buildings into charging/parking garages 😎 /s

[-] autotldr@lemmings.world 7 points 1 year ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


A big advantage of repurposing existing lampposts is that cities don't have to dig in order to lay new cables, says Artis Markots, the chief executive of the Latvian start-up SimpleCharge, which is focusing on Central and Eastern Europe.

Trojan Energy is a Scottish company whose chargers sit flush with the pavement, resembling miniature manhole covers from the outside.

The UK company Nyobolt recently created Bolt-ee, a compact, ultra-rapid charger that can provide up to 300kW of DC power to charge a car within minutes.

Fully mobile charging could be useful for people with disabilities, says Liana Cipcigan, a professor of transport electrification and smart grids at Cardiff University's School of Engineering.

In terms of fire risks, Mr Shivareddy says that Nyobolt has carefully designed Bolt-ee to be ultra-efficient, and thus to generate very little waste heat.

As Prof Cipcigan says, there is much space for innovation in the EV charging market, and younger and smaller companies "could make an interesting impact on this very complex landscape".


The original article contains 1,108 words, the summary contains 167 words. Saved 85%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[-] Tosti@feddit.nl 3 points 1 year ago

It will be interesting to know if the cables for these things can handle the load. On an individual level probable, but on larger scale?

[-] lnxtx@feddit.nl 6 points 1 year ago

If we change all street lighting to the LEDs, it will save about 200-250 W per pole. That's peanuts for the thirsty EVs.

Why not fast charge at the existing petrol stations? I know! Convenience.

[-] Fogle@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 year ago

Putting fast chargers at the gas stations going across empty highways is huge for ev travel

[-] scops@reddthat.com 3 points 1 year ago

On a hot day sitting in a parking lot, my Model 3 loses about 10% of its charge just cooling the battery. I am lucky to have the ability to charge at home so I don't have to worry about it, but if I was living in an apartment, I'd have constant anxiety about it discharging and not being ready when I need it. It's doable, but having to plan out an extra 20-30 minutes plus travel time to hit a charger, that's a fairly significant change to routine.

That said, yes, more EV charging at gas stations please. It's critical for road trips.

[-] wilberfan@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

It will be interesting to know if the cables for these things will be stolen for their copper or other metals on a regular basis.

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