Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging • Hacker News Board

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#61

Post by giantg2 » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

capableweb wrote: post #46

james_pm wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people can not charge at home. Where I live (Toronto), street parking is common. It's not possible to charge on the street near your house. Condos have parking garages and unless they put a charger at each single spot, most of those people can't charge either. Toyota has it right - there are huge issues to be solved before widespread roll out of EV is possible. The charging question is just one of them.

> Toyota has it right - there are huge issues to be solved before widespread roll out of EV is possible. The charging question is just one of them. Not sure what Toyota has to do with anything (can't find them mentioned in the article), but I think that problem is a catch-22 problem. No one is gonna want to solve any issues about EV roll out unless people start using EV, but no one is gonna want to use EV unless ther…

I think they brought up Toyota because they recently stated that EV adoption should not be accelerated.

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#62

Post by s1artibartfast » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

b112 wrote: post #47

giantg2 wrote: post #12

This seems misguided to me. One of the biggest benefits to an EV is not having to go to a gas station. Most people can charge at home for their typical needs. Next, it makes sense to put then at a person's work, then at stores or public parking. And of course there needs to be charging infrastructure on highway gas stations and/or rest stops. Making all gas stations, especially urban ones, pay a fine for not having c…

This seems misguided to me. It costs the city nothing, and is a revenue stream from those which don't comply. Win #1. It allows tourists, travellers a place to charge, which they know is maintained, and works, and is enroute to somewhere. There is no downside here, for the city.

The downside for the city is trampling over businesses and their resident owners.

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#63

Post by chx » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

giantg2 wrote: post #12

This seems misguided to me. One of the biggest benefits to an EV is not having to go to a gas station. Most people can charge at home for their typical needs. Next, it makes sense to put then at a person's work, then at stores or public parking. And of course there needs to be charging infrastructure on highway gas stations and/or rest stops. Making all gas stations, especially urban ones, pay a fine for not having c…

Most old high rises in the West End do not have the spare wattage to install even one charger in the underground parkade much less several. Getting some from BC Hydro is expensive and they really, really don't want to because they don't have much to spare either. It'll be likely 2030 before we get more. https://www.bchydro.com/energy-in-bc/projects/west-end-subst...

Also, the demand grows as climate change hits Vancouver hard -- check out the heat dome last summer. Spending money on an AC was laughable luxury before but now?

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#64

Post by tyrfing » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

> Modelling provided to the city estimated that about 30 per cent of gas stations and 40 per cent of parking lots would install chargers by 2030

Basically, they expect the majority of gas stations and parking lots to just pay the fee instead. Pretty solid indictment of the economics of installing chargers when even a 10k/year penalty isn't enough to tip the scale.

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#65

Post by giantg2 » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:54 PM UTC

chx wrote: post #63

giantg2 wrote: post #12

This seems misguided to me. One of the biggest benefits to an EV is not having to go to a gas station. Most people can charge at home for their typical needs. Next, it makes sense to put then at a person's work, then at stores or public parking. And of course there needs to be charging infrastructure on highway gas stations and/or rest stops. Making all gas stations, especially urban ones, pay a fine for not having c…

Most old high rises in the West End do not have the spare wattage to install even one charger in the underground parkade much less several. Getting some from BC Hydro is expensive and they really, really don't want to because they don't have much to spare either. It'll be likely 2030 before we get more. https://www.bchydro.com/energy-in-bc/projects/west-end-subst... Also, the demand grows as climate change hits Vanco…

If the bottleneck is energy supply, how are the gas stations expected to source their energy?

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#66

Post by mrandish » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:54 PM UTC

giantg2 wrote: post #12

This seems misguided to me. One of the biggest benefits to an EV is not having to go to a gas station. Most people can charge at home for their typical needs. Next, it makes sense to put then at a person's work, then at stores or public parking. And of course there needs to be charging infrastructure on highway gas stations and/or rest stops. Making all gas stations, especially urban ones, pay a fine for not having c…

> This seems misguided to me.

Agreed, and for more reasons than those you mention. This would increase costs of gas on poorer people (who can't afford a shiny new EV) to subsidize more convenient charging for wealthier people (who aren't even buying gas). It's effectively an additional tax on gasoline that gas station owners will pass on to all their customers who do buy gas.

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#67

Post by frenchy » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:54 PM UTC

capableweb wrote: post #46

james_pm wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people can not charge at home. Where I live (Toronto), street parking is common. It's not possible to charge on the street near your house. Condos have parking garages and unless they put a charger at each single spot, most of those people can't charge either. Toyota has it right - there are huge issues to be solved before widespread roll out of EV is possible. The charging question is just one of them.

> Toyota has it right - there are huge issues to be solved before widespread roll out of EV is possible. The charging question is just one of them. Not sure what Toyota has to do with anything (can't find them mentioned in the article), but I think that problem is a catch-22 problem. No one is gonna want to solve any issues about EV roll out unless people start using EV, but no one is gonna want to use EV unless ther…

> Not sure what Toyota has to do with anything

They're probably referencing the fact that Toyota has hedged their bets on hydrogen fuel instead of electric. As far as I'm aware though, that hedge has been going poorly for them.

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#68

Post by ep103 » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:54 PM UTC

djfobbz wrote: post #51

james_pm wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people can not charge at home. Where I live (Toronto), street parking is common. It's not possible to charge on the street near your house. Condos have parking garages and unless they put a charger at each single spot, most of those people can't charge either. Toyota has it right - there are huge issues to be solved before widespread roll out of EV is possible. The charging question is just one of them.

If people can't charge their vehicles at home (inside their garage), I see that as a burden on the city to provide adequate street based charging stations...similar to parking meters they already have.

Yeah, the city should step in to fill this role. Perhaps they could pass some sort of law requiring that current oil-based infrastructure has to support battery charging as well. Gas stations might be a particularly good target, since they are already geographically optimized for refueling vehicles.

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#69

Post by arcticbull » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:54 PM UTC

zeryx wrote: post #55

arcticbull wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's straight-up wrong. Home ownership rates in Canada are actually really high, 68.55% so more than 2/3 of Canadians own their own homes. [edit] In fact Surrey, while not Vancouver proper, comes in at the #4 spot for the highest percentage of millennials who own their homes. [1] [1] https://edisonfinancial.ca/millennial-home-ownership-canada/

Condos don't count.. unfortunately. Most condo boards don't support installing electric charging infrastructure.

Condo boards are made up of the residents who live in their buildings, so they do collectively own their own infrastructure. They will have to move in that direction, but it certainly is possible.

Re: Vancouver proposes 10k-dollar annual fee for gas stations without EV charging

#70

Post by brewdad » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 4:55 PM UTC

adhocmobility wrote: post #52

Waiting anywhere while your car is charging seems like an awful user experience. I've always imagined that a quick battery swap service would become the standard. Don't know how feasible it is though, maybe someone can shed more light on that.

We would need to develop a single standard and a limited number of battery sizes for this to ever be feasible. Go look at how many different starter batteries your typical auto parts store has to stock. Now imagine doing that with batteries that are much larger and much riskier if they are stored/handled improperly.