400kW charger - how many of these on a typical local network ?

Joined
4 Nov 2010
Messages
6,129
Reaction score
656
Location
Cumbria
Country
United Kingdom
Just came across this report on Wired
"Chargepoint is slowly building up to chargers that can deliver up to 400 kW"
Yeah, I'm sure the average DNO network will be happy to have a few of those on it :whistle:
 
Sponsored Links
The secret is revealed in the article

A third type of box contains a big battery (either 70 or 160 kWh), which the system can use to charge cars extra quickly, even when the connection to the grid isn’t powerful enough. The battery does need to recharge between fast-charging sessions though, so it’s best suited for locations where demand isn’t too high and it wouldn’t make economic sense to upgrade the main supply.

And also how many people can afford that class of super car.

Porsche says it plans to equip its nearly 200 US dealers with the setup, which will at least serve the more wealthy areas where their buyers live and drive.
 
Porsche says it plans to equip its nearly 200 US dealers with the setup, which will at least serve the more wealthy areas where their buyers live and drive, but not very far.
But we do need to stop thinking about charging cars in the same way that we refuel them.

If people had a pipe delivering petrol or diseasel to their homes so they could top their tank up every night how many would need to refill elsewhere, and how often?
 
Batteries change everything. Although the total consumption off the grid will increase, the demand will be much smoother, which is better for everyone.
 
Sponsored Links
It only talks about batteries being in some of the chargers - certainly not all of them. Having batteries in the charger will increase cost and size - and ongoing costs as they'll be a maintenance item. And as the article quotes one of the charging point suppliers, not much use for a busy location - which many would end up being if EV took off big time.
Slow charging at home is never going to be more than a pipe dream for many. Looking at close family, some of them don't even have a front yard - the front door opens directly into the street, and one has double yellow lines past the door as there wouldn't be room to park there without causing an obstruction. These same people won't be getting charged while at work either for various reasons.
And lets quietly overlook the fossil fuel that would be burned to generate the lecky :whistle:
 
But we do need to stop thinking about charging cars in the same way that we refuel them.

If people had a pipe delivering petrol or diseasel to their homes so they could top their tank up every night how many would need to refill elsewhere, and how often?

Well, with the pathetic range of most reasonably prices all-electric vehicles currently availably, quite often! Hopefully that will change fair soon.
 
Last edited:
If people had a pipe delivering petrol or diseasel to their homes so they could top their tank up every night how many would need to refill elsewhere, and how often?
That's an interesting point which has been made quite often in the past, but it set me thinking ...
At one time houses all had a large tank of water in the attic, so on the few occasions when the water was off (we had one just last year due to a major burst pipe up near the reservoir), you can at least still have enough water to wash your hands or boils a kettle (or if careful, even have a warm shower). Not to mention, most houses had at least one thing other than the central heating that could be used for heat if the electric was off (a more common occurrence).
Now it's normal to have no stored water, and no means of heating (either the house or hot water) without electric - gas is fine but does nowt if there's no lecky to run the boiler. We seem to have simultaneously headed down a road of less resilience at the household level to services interruptions - coupled with a tighter margin on services (particularly lecky) such that interruptions are (IMO) likely to get more frequent in the future. I've sort-of got contingency plans and should be able to keep our house warm if the lecky goes off - and which neighbours to check up on.
 
We seem to have simultaneously headed down a road of less resilience at the household level to services interruptions

and also we are increasingly at risk of failures in domestic equipment such as boilers and home "automation" systems. Boilers and un-vented hot water storage systems have to have complicated control and safety systems to make them ( it is claimed ) more efficient. The more complex the design the more there is to go wrong in hardware and higher risk of an error or omission in the design of the software.
 
Last edited:
Funnily enough, the other day I popped into the plumbers merchants and there was a chap with a stall evangelising the Nest products - cameras, thermostats, smoke alarms, ...
We had an "interesting exchange of views" as to the merits of all this "smart" stuff and what happens when the network is down, why would I want to pass all that information over to a Google owned company, etc. I was able to explain to him why smart meters are being pushed so far (rationing by price management, and if that fails, by rolling disconnects - he was too young to remember the 70s), and how they collect and store far more information than is needed for the job that they do. Clearly, and he realised this, I am not the target market for Nest products :whistle:
I think the counter chap found it rather interesting to listen to.

At one point the Nest guy said, of information security, that if I were (for example) to setup a new clean email address and use it only to register and use the Nest services - that the fact I'd get no spam would show that things were secure :eek: I carefully explained to him that this was a complete non-sequiteur and security is about far more than just not getting spam to an email address - not collecting what you don't need to is a good start.

I also suggested that having a "best buy" rating from Which? doesn't mean anything. They recently gave a best buy to an IoTat device with known crap security, and in the past (I used to subscribe) I frequently found their reviews in areas I know about to be of "little accuracy or value".
 
why would I want to pass all that information over to a Google owned company,

Just been chatting to an old friend who grew up in the old East Germany. One thing he said a few years ago was that Google and similar data harvestors would soon know more about individuals than the STAZI ( East Germany secret police ) would ever have learnt. I think he had made an accurate prediction.
 
No, your friend was wrong - they won't soon know more, they knew more a long time ago (past tense) !
 
Well, with the pathetic range of most reasonably prices all-electric vehicles currently availably, quite often! Hopefully that will change fair soon.
Virtually all electric cars can do 100+ miles on one charge.
The average car journey in the UK is about 10 miles.
Very few people drive more than 100 miles in a day, so for most people the existing range is plenty.
 
Virtually all electric cars can do 100+ miles on one charge.
That is what @davelx said, that range is pathetic when all ICE cars do 300-500 per tank.

The average car journey in the UK is about 10 miles.
True but almost totally irrelevant. Average mileage is c. 7,800/year which equates to 21 miles/day if evenly spread over 365 days. In practice this will include lots of short journeys (10 miles or less) and a number of longer, maybe much longer, ones.

Very few people drive more than 100 miles in a day
Any evidence for that? I would have thought that virtually everyone drives more than 100 miles in a day a reasonable number of times per year; visiting friends / family, holidays, etc.

so for most people the existing range is plenty.
I think that the number of people who can use an EV as their only car is tiny. I suspect an awful lot of people have it as a second car that is limited in what it can do and they have an ICE car that can do anything the EV can and lots more besides.
 
Stephen - what is your experience?

Rather than speculate about what others must surely do, if your car magically had a full tank of petrol or diseasel every morning you woke up, how many times so far this year would you have needed to visit a filling station?
 
Stephen - what is your experience?

Rather than speculate about what others must surely do, if your car magically had a full tank of petrol or diseasel every morning you woke up, how many times so far this year would you have needed to visit a filling station?

My car does have a fully charged battery every morning, and for most of my day-to-day travel, the daily range is sufficient. However, when I visit family, or travel to the coast for saliing, etc, it is not. Fortunately my car has an on-board generator, so I am not range limited.

However, for me to have a pure electric car I would require the range to be at leat 250miles, and I would want to be able to get to 80% recharge in 30 minutes at a service station charge point for it to be viable as my only car.
 

DIYnot Local

Staff member

If you need to find a tradesperson to get your job done, please try our local search below, or if you are doing it yourself you can find suppliers local to you.

Select the supplier or trade you require, enter your location to begin your search.


Are you a trade or supplier? You can create your listing free at DIYnot Local

 
Sponsored Links
Back
Top