Electric vehicle drivers get candid about charging: ‘Logistical nightmare’
Electric vehicle drivers get candid about charging: ‘Logistical nightmare’
Charging on the go is neither easy nor fast.
February 26, 2023, 4:00 AM
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YouTube personality Steve Hammes leased a Hyundai Kona Electric sport utility vehicle for his 17-year-old daughter Maddie for three reasons: it was affordable, practical and allowed Maddie to put her cash toward college, not fuel. Now, the upstate New York resident has a dilemma many EV owners can relate to: finding available charging stations far away from home.
“We’re going through the planning process of how easily Maddie can get from Albany to Gettysburg [College] and where she can charge the car,” Hammes told ABC News. “It makes me a little nervous. We want fast chargers that take 30 to 40 minutes — it would not make sense to sit at a Level 2 charger for hours. There isn’t a good software tool that helps EV owners plan their trips.”
Last week the Biden administration said Tesla would open its Supercharger network to non-Tesla owners by the end of 2024. The plan includes 3,500 Tesla fast chargers and 4,000 of its slower, Level 2 chargers — a small number in Tesla’s sprawling network. Setting up an account on Tesla’s app is also required for access.
John Voelcker, an industry expert on EVs and the former editor of Green Car Reports, said this arrangement will allow Tesla to learn a lot about U.S. drivers — “how you charge, where you drive and what car you have.” He does not expect Tesla to commit to additional charging stations.
“Tesla does not want its highly reliable and tightly integrated charging network to be clogged with people whose cars can’t charge as fast as Teslas,” he told ABC News.
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President Joe Biden prioritized emissions-free vehicles in the 2021 infrastructure law, vowing to increase the number of green vehicles on America’s highways and local roads. The president’s goals include installing 500,000 new chargers across the U.S. and dramatically boosting EV sales by 2030.
Voelcker said he’s seen little improvement in the nation’s charging infrastructure in the last four years and frequently hears c
