If you own an electric vehicle, how easy is it to find a charging station? According to a report by CoPilot, with only 20.8 chargers per 100,000 residents. Vermont, which tops the list, has 139.7 chargers per 100,000 residents.
If you own an electric vehicle, how easy is it to find a charging station? According to a report by CoPilot, with only 20.8 chargers per 100,000 residents. Vermont, which tops the list, has 139.7 chargers per 100,000 residents.
3 comments:
Baffling. PA has several programs (some timed; some ongoing) that enable communities to install charging stations at zero cost (really) and actually collect royalties (really) on their use. Contractors can/will use state grants to perform traffic studies, logistics, installation, repair, and maintenance. If your town or township hasn't EV charging stations it's because they haven't taken the five minutes required to figure it out - for free. Or they simply don't want to. Even little Chapman and Portland can get this done rather easily, let alone the area's larger munis.
The electric grid is not large enough to support all these additional charging stations. Doesn’t matter how the extra electricity is generated if you can’t get it distributed.
I’m on my third plug-in EV. The first, a Ford from 2017, was a hybrid that I could plug in. The second and third were full electrics, a Chevy Bolt and a Hyundai Ioniq 5 (current [ahem] vehicle).
Right now EVs are more suitable for homeowners who can easily and inexpensively plug their car into a 220 volt dryer plug and get a full charge overnight. That is not a stress to the environment. I use the Electrify America charging station out at Cedar Crest and Tilghman for my fast charges. There’s usually an available spot and the chargers are usually working.
10:32 argues that the electric grid is not large enough to support all these additional charging stations. May I point out to 10:32 the many large vacant retail spaces with huge rooftop chillers. Every BonTon, KMart, Walmart, etc., now abandoned are wired for the kind of power needed to offer public charging stations. Brixmor, a shopping center owner with locations at Stefko and Cedar Crest (where I charge), sees the benefits and realizes the power is available.
Other places where electricity savings is getting realized is in more efficient homes. All my home lighting is now LED, drawing less power than when the bulbs were incandescent. Our investor-owned utilities like PPL and FirstEnergy/MetEd are going to see the benefits to their stockholders to increase capacity as well as find more creative ways to find electricity locally. For example, the PPL depot over at Sherman north of Union Boulevard in Allentown is about to get PV roof panels. A lot of incremental change goes a long way.
As Tesla gradually opens its Supercharger stations to non-Tesla cars - and it’s started as part of the energy portions of recent legislation - it’s going to get easier for renters as well as for homeowners.
Norway is at 40 percent EVs now. They had a cultural shift. Their grid is fine. We’ll be fine too. I’m more concerned, frankly, about the costs I’m avoiding in gas tax by driving a more efficient and cheaper to operate EV.
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