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Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

theglobeandmail.com

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Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#321

Post by r00fus »

freehunter wrote: post #51
goatinaboat wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People just don't seem to want it. People right now feel that the advantages of batteries integrated throughout the chassis are greater.

Yeah standard swappable batteries are nice but as we can see in the cell phone and laptop world, they're very restrictive on design choices. And since EVs are very sensitive to weight and aerodynamics, coupled with the fact that EV makers are trying to put as many batteries into the car as they can, there's just no way to make a one-size-fits-all battery that works for every car. You'd either need to trade off batter…

What about liability ? My car catches fire with a swapped battery. Whose fault is it? Or a less deadly but more probable “I only got 20mi range when it told me 200”

Sounds like shocking possibilities.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#322

Post by drivers99 »

rjbwork wrote: post #308
mises wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think when he says "show up looking presentable", it may be that he needs to be in suits or business casual, preferably unwrinkled. Also, I am exceptionally disinclined to bike through below-zero weather, snow tires or no (referring to the hypothetical canadian). Let alone Texas summers, which regularly hit 105 this time of year. I don't care if there are showers or not, it's just darn unpleasant to be outside this…

Sub-zero weather isn't too bad down to maybe -10C. After that, it's pretty brutal. I do try not to take superfluous trips on my e-bike above maybe 95 though.

Since he's talking in F (e.g. 105), when he says sub-zero, he means -18C or lower. Or did you mean -10F?

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#323

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

m4rtink wrote: post #125
SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine the same people who are garage orphans are probably also those who haven't got time to charge their machines for an hour or two. That's already a concern for road trips, but day to day that'll be a nightmare. Just hang around the charging station for an hour while your car recharges.

Is "garage orphan" really a commonly used term? It sounds really weird & needlessly emotional to me. Just saying "people without a garage" seems perfectly adequate to me & does not require manufacturing new terms.

> Among EV experts, there’s a name for folks who have to park on the street: garage orphans.

Apparently The Globe And Mail thinks it has value.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#324

Post by jgust »

rconti wrote: post #225
jaclaz wrote: post #149

Besides garage orphans, also those with self standing homes and a garage will have (or become) a problem. Say that in you street that are 50 single family homes connected to a same cabin/transformer. The electric infrastructure powering them (lines, transformer, etc.) has been dimensioned to power them at their average current power consumption rate + something to take care of peaks + something more to take care of e…

My Model 3 charges at ~240v/48a, which is around 11kW. At peak times in our house, say, heat on, lights on, TV on, cooking, doing laundry, we pull perhaps 3kW. Our house is pretty efficient; gas appliances, LED lights, no air conditioning, etc. The car charges after 9pm, but that's just because our rate drops then. If midnight was even cheaper, it would charge then. We don't charge every day, but if we did, it would…

I imagine a world where the electricity grid is intelligent enough to have a "conversation" with appliances to efficiently spread load across the day, more accurately plan capacity, and do it at a lower cost to consumers and the environment.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#326

Post by Decade »

torpfactory wrote: post #311
wffurr wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or build out infrastructure in those areas too. In suburbs, there's plenty of room for separate bike paths and trains. It doesn't require everyone to move into Soviet-style superblocks and towers.

Trains don’t work in suburbs not because of space limitations - there just aren’t enough paying customers per mile of track to make the economics work.

There are not enough taxpaying residents to make roads work, either. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/4/30/my-city-has-ma...

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#327

Post by stevenhubertron »

wffurr wrote: post #127

Yet another reason the real answer to the climate crisis isn't EVs - it's public transit, bicycles, e-bikes, scooters, e-scooters, walking, etc. All these other modes are much lower impact on the environment than purchasing and operating an EV, much less an ICE.

Agree. I have an ebike and commute 8 miles each way. It's been fantastic and I arrive home in the afternoon feeling fresh despite it being 95F out.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#328

Post by stevenhubertron »

mises wrote: post #306
wffurr wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't put the kids on the ebike to daycare? Seems like that would be faster and easier than dealing with a car. Just wait until you start in on the total mess that is school drop-off when every parent decides they have to drive their kid to school. Much faster to breeze past the stopped traffic on a bicycle, unstrap the kids and send them on their way, and bike to the train.

Not every one has only two kids. It's going to get awfully tough for those with four or five without a minivan.

So when you get to that edge edge case they drive a mini-van. No one is saying ban cars, just use them less.

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#329

Post by ysavir »

chc wrote: post #307
ysavir wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's GP's point: Instead of investing in EVs, we should be expanding public transport to reduce the dependencies on personal vehicles in the first place.

Who is "we"? I don't know about where you are, but where I live, there is tons of public transport, with more being developed all the time, but nobody wants to use it because the design of the area is fundamentally unsuited to mass transit. If we spent 1/10 the time and money making infrastructure for EVs, everyone would be able to have one already, but we don't. We keep trying and failing to make public transit work…

Okay, fine, we should build out public transport and start designing city and suburban features around public transport.

Is that satisfactory?

Re: Where will ‘garage orphans’ charge electric cars?

#330

Post by stordoff »

Reason077 wrote: post #83
SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it feasible to put in hundreds of high voltage chargers?

Perhaps not today, because there aren't enough cars to use them - demand needs to catch up. But yes, it's feasible to fill entire parking lots with outlets at every parking spot. There are already examples of this in Norway. The outlets can be built to share and distribute available power, so the grid connection required is not as huge as you might think. In practice this isn't an issue, as it's unlikely that every o…

> The outlets can be built to share and distribute available power, so the grid connection required is not as huge as you might think

Doesn't this re-introduce the original problem? If less power is available, you have to spend longer charging.

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