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Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

reuters.com

171–180 of 193 posts

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#171
I'd really wish there was a standard for large-size battery packs an a simple, open protocol for the battery to advertise charge/load limits as well as charging method.

This would totally change the dynamic of EVs.

Go to a station, just hot-swap the batteries and be gone. Charging time becomes irrelevant: the stations can be as small as they're now (parking wire), they just need storage for hot batteries and chargers. Because that's how you use anything _serious_ which is electric right now such as power tools and drones: you don't wait for charging.

The idea of "waiting for charging" is something which is fine at home, or to charge the secondary battery pack.

Batteries in modern e-bikes are almost that already. The battery itself includes a controller which advertises what the batter can do often regulates both charge and discharge. This allows the battery to be changed and upgraded in the future.

The limiting factor is that currently every company that does this (f you bosch) wants to keep this as closed as possible, meaning that we essentially can't escape the vendor lock-in or even fix your own battery pack.

This needs to die. If I know I can get a charged battery at every station and be paying for delivered power I wouldn't care less about having my own. This would also put more incentives in keeping those packs as efficient as possible, which in turns is incredibly good for the environment.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe just swap cars. They can maintain a small inventory of fully charged EVs, just swap your depleted EV out and be on your way. Then your previous EV gets charged up for the next guy.

and then ... "oh crap, left my (phone|charger|book|scarf|lipstick|pocket knife) in the other vehicle" ...

Oh I’m sure that would happen - and it would probably be the same 10% of people who leave 90% of the stuff behind.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#173

Seems like policy written by petrol car drivers and not well thought out. In the future electric vehicle world 95% of charging will be done at home, or in some facility near your rental building. Most EV drivers have no need to visit charging stations unless they're going on an extended road trip, and then we need a particular _kind_ of DC fast charging station. I mean... I have an EV and I could count on two hands t…

Given how crowded Tesla Superchargers are, its not that crazy of a concept

Plus some gas station chains were proactive in having super charger's placed on their property. Sheetz in PA did this.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#174
post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the people can't charge at home, it's not the US.

Why would anyone buy an electric car if they couldn't charge that car overnight in their own garage?

Meaningless question because you won't have a garage in your life.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#175
post #64

Seems like policy written by petrol car drivers and not well thought out. In the future electric vehicle world 95% of charging will be done at home, or in some facility near your rental building. Most EV drivers have no need to visit charging stations unless they're going on an extended road trip, and then we need a particular _kind_ of DC fast charging station. I mean... I have an EV and I could count on two hands t…

Most EV drivers have no need to visit charging stations [...] You do realise that we're talking about Germany here, don't you? You cannot apply US standards to a foreign country with 7x the population density and only a ~50% home ownership rate... The fact of the matter is, that half of German households cannot charge their vehicles at home, because they live in a rented apartment. In cities in particular (you know,…

"You do realise that we're talking about Germany here, don't you? You cannot apply US standards"

a) I'm not in the US. b) My extended family is all German. I'm quite familiar with the differences in Germany. Gas stations are still not the right distribution model.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another problem is that even if you are lucky to be able to rent a garage for a few hundred bucks per month, you are not able to get your car charged inside. A lot of building regulations will prevent that, including Erschliessungsgebühren, Elektroverträglichkeitsmessungen, the required VDE Sicherheitsprüfungen and the fact that each garage lot would require a legal address in order for paying Energiesteuer there, as…

Anecdote: I pay 20€/month for my garage lot.

In Berlin it varies widely, but 100€ a month is not unreasonable.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#177

Seems like policy written by petrol car drivers and not well thought out. In the future electric vehicle world 95% of charging will be done at home, or in some facility near your rental building. Most EV drivers have no need to visit charging stations unless they're going on an extended road trip, and then we need a particular _kind_ of DC fast charging station. I mean... I have an EV and I could count on two hands t…

>Seems like policy written by petrol car drivers It sounds like policy written by the convenience stores (I assume some sort of convenience store owners special interest group or association exists in Germany). Their business model is they sell gas at approximately break even and make all their $$ on the store. They stand to lose big as things move electric. If they can get out in front of it and be the place where p…

I've been to Autobahn petrol stations in Germany. They are not pleasant places. They need to work on that before they can entice people to come in and spend anywhere from 30 minutes to a couple of hours there.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#178

Seems like policy written by petrol car drivers and not well thought out. In the future electric vehicle world 95% of charging will be done at home, or in some facility near your rental building. Most EV drivers have no need to visit charging stations unless they're going on an extended road trip, and then we need a particular _kind_ of DC fast charging station. I mean... I have an EV and I could count on two hands t…

Battery swap station: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlaQuKk9bFg

I'm not sure why this is a not reality yet. When this happens, I will certainly not be the one refuelling my car at -30C in the winter, I will be seated in my electric car waiting for the swap to complete.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#179
post #64

Seems like policy written by petrol car drivers and not well thought out. In the future electric vehicle world 95% of charging will be done at home, or in some facility near your rental building. Most EV drivers have no need to visit charging stations unless they're going on an extended road trip, and then we need a particular _kind_ of DC fast charging station. I mean... I have an EV and I could count on two hands t…

Most EV drivers have no need to visit charging stations [...] You do realise that we're talking about Germany here, don't you? You cannot apply US standards to a foreign country with 7x the population density and only a ~50% home ownership rate... The fact of the matter is, that half of German households cannot charge their vehicles at home, because they live in a rented apartment. In cities in particular (you know,…

the 2nd favorite activity in HN is to talk about shit they have no idea about.

Re: Germany will require all petrol stations to provide electric car charging

#180
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OP said home, not house. This would include apartments.

This is how a typical German residential street looks ( https://reidiculoustravels.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/dsc_0... ) It's not really trivial to pack that full of chargers if you don't want to interfer with pedestrians or cyclists.

The bulk of the charger would have to be embedded in the street or sidewalk with only the cable protruding. That might make for a pretty expensive installation, but it could be done.
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