On Oct 19, 2015, at 3:24 AM, brucedp5 via EV <ev@lists.evdl.org> wrote:
> In broad strokes, if you're confident that you can charge your car at home > every night--or at work every day--then recharge rate may not be quite so > important. They're handwaving away the most important point. People new to EVs are paranoid about the time it takes to recharge. People who've lived with an EV for a few weeks wonder what all the fuss is about. My parents went through this...Dad did a lot of searching for a cheap 220 charger for their new-to-them Leaf. Now, while they wouldn't turn one down if you offered them one for free, they have no interest in spending money on one. I think a lot of people unfamiliar with EVs get hung up on the time to charge the battery from empty, when the important metric is the time to charge the battery after a day's typical usage. If you figure 3 miles per kWh for a typical EV, you'll recharge at about 10 MPH from a standard 110 circuit. Doesn't sound like much...but that's 80 miles after 8 hours, and most of us are either asleep that long or, at least, spend that much time asleep plus showering and eating and the like. In practice, most people would have no trouble plugging in for 10 or 12 hours a day at home, giving 100 - 120 miles. And, save for road trips, how many people even put 80 miles on the road in a given day? And on the rare days when that happens...how often does it happen day after day? Let's say you've got a 200-mile range EV, as is promised for the next generation of cars. Start the day with a full charge. Drive 100 miles that single day and end the day with 100 miles. Plug in only for 8 hours, start the next day with "only" 180 miles. You could keep that pattern up for over a week before you'd start to have legitimate reason for range anxiety. Give the car a couple days of 12-hour charges on your (presumed) weekend when you're only putting a few dozen miles per day on the car, and you're all caught back up again. And I think it's safe to suggest that what I just described is a rather extreme situation, even in America. Not unheard of, but very unusual. Fast charging is nice to have, sure. But it becomes _less_ important with bigger batteries, not more -- and we're emphatically headed to bigger batteries. But the only time you actually _need_ fast charging -- assuming overnight access to a 110 outlet is as ubiquitous as it typically is -- is for road trips or other scenarios where you're spending almost as much time in the car as you do in bed. And most people are renting cars for road trips these days anyway.... Cheers, b& _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org Read EVAngel's EV News at http://evdl.org/evln/ Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
