Also city dwellers with street parking and it’s hard charge, so a pure EV is a bad fit.
Hybrids with their good mileage although complex are a good fit for those.
Also city dwellers with street parking and it’s hard charge, so a pure EV is a bad fit.
Hybrids with their good mileage although complex are a good fit for those.
I thought this but after 3 years I can say it is unfounded. the only reason I ever think about my state of charge on the city is when I need it to be low so I can use street parking that requires me to charge.
We really need more slow charging stations for folks to just park at. I’d have assumed that the economics would have been favorable to charge by the day/night rather than by the minute.
Every street lamp has 15a of power already running to it. It would be trivial to add an outlet to each one.
There’s a genuine technical issue: the AC EVSE protocols (J1772, NACS, etc) have several safety features that are far in excess of anything you’ll find in a regular 15A NEMA receptacle. I don’t think it would be wise to gave high traffic NEMA receptacles on fully weather-exposed streetlights.
The hardware for the safety systems would not be expensive in volume, but the cable and connector are expensive and bulky. And none of the EVSE standards are specified in a variant where the receptacle is fixed and the car carries the cable.
This is solvable, obviously. I don’t know whether drivers would want to deal with having their own cables, though.
Having your own cable for AC (here it's Type 2) is the norm in Europe, so I'd say it's survivable.
AIUI, Tesla really screwed the pooch here. For the original Model S, Tesla really really wanted the US model to tuck the charge socket under the little hinged reflector, and they couldn’t figure out how to fit the Type 2 “Mennekes” connector their. So they invented their own socket (which evolved into NACS), and the Tesla one is rather inferior to Type 2, at least when used for AC charging.
And now every EV needs to have a different charge port configuration for North America vs Europe, and North America is stuck with NACS. (NACS is fine for DC but still sucks for AC. It cannot support 3-phase charging (which I admit has always seemed like a silly feature except in the limited case of 1 or 2 chargers in a single family residence), and cables and adapters cannot passively report their current rating. So you would need to build a kind of gnarly active MITM system to make a safe extension cable, whereas a Type 2 to Type 2 cable is built part of the Type 2 design.
Later, Tesla proved the whole thing pointless by successfully fitting Type 2 in the same location…
I think the timeline is a bit off. When Tesla designed its connector, Type 2 wasn’t yet the established European standard. Tesla had shown its proprietary connector by 2011 and shipped it in 2012; Type 2 wasn’t selected as Europe’s common connector until 2013.
When Tesla later engineered the European Model S, it needed three-phase AC and adopted a modified Type 2 connector, which fitted behind essentially the same tail light door.
But that’s all history now.
Arguably both markets ended up with good solutions for their needs: NACS is exceptionally compact and well suited to North American single-phase AC plus DC fast charging, while Type 2 is larger but supports Europe’s widespread three-phase AC.
> Arguably both markets ended up with good solutions for their needs
Only because everyone aimed too low. NACS (as mentioned before) doesn’t cleanly support adapters or detachable cables. And CCS Combo 2 is unnecessarily clunky. And you end up in a rather awkward position if you ship a car from the EU to North America or vice versa.
It ought to be entirely straightforward to design a standardized cable, NACS at one end and with a new interface at the other, that can attach and detach from a compact and weather resistant charge port. It would be fully compatible with all NACS vehicles, and it would achieve this by negotiating voltage and current limits with the EVSE at the other (newly specified) end.
It could even be cheap in a low-current version — it would basically be an extension cord, with two 12AWG hots and a ground plus a couple of little wires and the whatever inexpensive electrical parts are needed to declare its capabilities. If you can buy an e-marked USB-C cable for a few dollars, the latter won’t cost much.
European Model S has Type 2 in that location, only ones that don't fit is the Type 2 CCS with giant DCFC pins below the regular Type 2. NACS is just Tesla doing Apple.
NACS is far less clunky than CCS. And don’t get me started on ChaDeMo - my best guess is that whoever designed it thought that big heavy awkward gasoline nozzles where cool and wanted their EV chargers to be at least as massive.
> 3-phase charging (which I admit has always seemed like a silly feature
Well, 3phase is more efficient as you have less losses in the cabling.
May save you 5-10% on the bill.
3 phase has a property that the total power is (with fully balanced loads and no harmonics) constant. But n phases, equally spaced in phase angle, each an RMS voltage V from ground, with RMS current I per phase in phase with the voltage to ground, gives power n•V•I. (I’m assuming that n>=2 so that there is no neutral current.) There’s no savings for n=3 vs n=2.
There is a savings over the system in which you use 2 of 3 phases, which gives unbalanced phase angles. And that system is widely used in the US in non-single-family installations. But if you have a bunch of chargers, you put 1/3 of them on each of the pairs of phases, and everything balances back out at the panel whenever a decent number of chargers are in use.
Maybe, if a a car could rely on having 3 phases, it could avoid some ripple filtering by taking advantage of constant supply power (no 2f component), but cars need to be able to charge from a single phase even in Europe.
The point is that EVSE plugs are safer and European dryer plugs under the rain out in the open is technically kind of dangerous.
No, the cable you carry for AC charging has a Type 2 connector on both sides, it's purely an EV charging cable. It's not the same 3-phase plug you'd plug a table saw into.
I got it, we need a new USB-C connector (C for Car), that'd be something to see.
And how many amps does the street light draw? And how many are on the same circuit? How much extra capacity is there on that circuit to charge a car? I'd bet it's close to zero.
Probably not. Often that 15a is shared with several others nearby. In many cases there is a light sensor on one light that controls them all. Sometimes the transformers that supplies them isn't big enough for more load.
Of course easy city and decade did something different so there is no universal. However issues like the above will mean it isn't easy. You need to examine each street on a case by cases bases and that makes it hard even though the work for any individual street isn't hard. Where it works great, but it isn't easy anymore.
That said, for all new lights they should all have a charger built in. The cost is small and quantity will bring it down even more.
There is not enough street lamps to charge a meaningful fraction of cars. I mean, look at the streets, there is so, so many cars, parked everywhere they can fit.
But I agree in principle - the power wiring is there already, it's a matter of spamming cheap low-power outlets wherever cars tend to congregate for a rest.
They should develop an easy to install add-on for streetlamps that adds two charging ports and a payment terminal.
> and a payment terminal
This should really be handled in the car and through the charging cable.
Which (obviously) already exists (google it). I haven't ever seen one in actual use however.
Is the hybrid car then just a social cover for “I want gas savings, but where I live doesn’t have EVSEs?”
It almost reminds me of mechanical alarm clocks from the 70s, where they are designed to look like an electronic model but are just driven by AC motors (1).
(1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zWqweWjsbU
You got the time arrow the wrong way around. Those mechanical digital clocks predate the LED ones by a number of years.
They worked on the same principle as the old mechanical signs at airports and train stations.
So it was mechanical first with the motors, then the LED display and then LCD and then the current TFT etc.
I recently got a hybrid because I wanted better gas mileage--no more, no less. Without subsidies, I can't get the math to work for an EV.
It just depends on gas prices vs. electricity cost in your area.
For example in the US it makes perfect sense to own an EV in California, but no sense in Texas for example.
EVs make sense in Texas as well. While gas is cheaper in Texas, Electric is also cheaper and so these balance out.
The above is for most people. There are exceptions in both states where gas makes more sense.
I don’t understand the logic of this. Can you math it out?
There's a really easy calculator available at https://chooseev.com/savings-calculator/ You can play with different values for vehicles and local prices.[0][1]
It looks to me like an EV makes as much sense in Texas as anywhere. The places where EVs don't make sense currently have average gas prices but high electricity prices, like the Northeast.
[0] https://gasprices.aaa.com/todays-state-averages/
[1] https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.ph...
Not going to do the math but in California gas is expensive and tax rebates still exist. Where I work there is a charger at most parking spaces.
https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/gas-taxes-state/
https://www.gov.ca.gov/2026/08/07/governor-newsom-announces-...
I can't vouchers for the specifics, but it could make sense because gas and electricity prices as well as incentives vary a lot between US states.
> For example in the US it makes perfect sense to own an EV in California, but no sense in Texas for example.
It makes a lot of sense to own and operate an EV in Texas. At my current electricity rate, the energy cost per mile for my EV is something like 4¢/mi. I just bought gas this morning, gas was $3.75/gal for me in a very cheap gas part of town in Texas (many places are closer to $4). To get that same energy cost per mile, I'd need to get ~94MPG.
Let's compare it to a car that gets like 35mpg, and say I drove a normal average US mileage of 14,000mi in a year. $560 for energy costs in the EV, let's be fair and add on the extra $200 in taxes Texas is currently adding to EVs, $760. How much did I spend on gas on that 35MPG car? 14,000mi / 35MPG = 400 gallons, * $3.75 = $1,500/yr.
Are they though? I mean you also don't have a gas station at the curb but you get by. Maybe you just need to charge at a public charging point. Just because you have an EV doesn't mean you absolute NEED to charge at home for it to make sense.
Public charging is almost as expensive as gas though
Around me gas is $4.00/gallon right now, and the public fast charging station closest to me is $0.39/KWh. It’s actually cheaper to burn gas unless you get less than ~30mpg (at least compare to my EV which gets about 3.2M/KWh). But I charge at home at about $0.14/KWh so it’s much cheaper than gas.
Long story short, I’d never have bought an EV if I couldn’t charge at home or work.
About half as expensive where I live and the way I drive.
I kinda think home charging is important. You never know when the public charger will have no spots.
I can fill my 35L tank, pay, and be on my way in about 2 minutes. That gives me about 750km of autonomy. That's why I don't mind not having a gas station at the curb.
I can also show up at the gas station at any moment with a reasonable upper wait limit.
It's a bit disingenuous to ignore the downsides of not being able to charge at home. Public charging points may not exist, be too few, or be taken. If you drive enough, then you somewhat need to structure your life around charging your car.
Thankfully we're getting close to ~10 mins to go from 10% to 80% charge with newer models. Battery tech is actually advancing very steadily, so it won't be long for this to trickle down to cheaper models either.
Rules are also going in the right direction where I live. The onus is now on the homeowner association to justify denying you the permission to install a charging spot by your private parking space.
I luckily live in a building with reasonable people, but it's the exception rather than the rule.
AIUI, fast charging still degrades the battery faster than slower/overnight charging so should only be done when absolutely necessary. Is that still true?
In modern EVs, not really, but we don’t have enough data for the latest 500kW+ monsters.
I doubt it's anywhere near that fast in winter when its freezing out.
Driving hybrid still burns gas, generating CO2 which is destroying the world. Why would anyone pick it when EVs are available is beyond me.
It's not that simple. A pure EV needs ~10x as much battery as a PHEV. So for the same amount of batteries produced, you could make 10x as many vehicles PHEVs as EVs. Not all vehicles can be EVs due to practical issues.
Which results in more total electric miles driven replacing gas? I don't know, but "gas is destroying the world" is a brain short circuit.
EVs are more expensive. Hope that helps.
Yes, EV's solve one of the many negative impacts of cars. It's not some magic bullet.
They still depend on minerals that require destructive mining from equipment that runs on fossil fuels, still use rubber tires, still has tons of plastics that are made with petroleum, still dependent on a power grid mainly sustained by fossil fuels...
We should be thinking bigger than this, even. Walk, ride a bike, or take public transit whenever possible. If it's not possible, try to move somewhere where it is.
We must be willing to be slightly inconvenienced for the greater good instead of arguing about which type of car to drive. People don't want to have that conversation, though.
Typically the driving distances are pretty short in a city, so you don't have to charge that often.
The smaller size of an EV would be more useful in most European cities, at least.
I'd correct this to be "a smaller sized EV" versus "the smaller size of an EV" as many of the EVs on the market are surprisingly big. Without pointing to the obvious behemoth truck/SUV EVs, my Tesla MY is considerably larger than a lot of CUVs on the market and has a much worse turning radius. What it does do well is stop and start fast meaning I can be more decisive and navigate through messy NYC/BOS traffic with more confidence than in my CRV, and regen braking + having lower "idling" costs does improve its city-profile.
That's the irony of EVs. They're most useful in cities--short driving distances and less emissions in dense areas, but easiest for the consumer to use in the burbs where driving distances are longer and emissions are less of an issue.
I'd say they're most useful in suburbs. You can charge them overnight in your driveway or garage so there's almost no reason not to have one unless you're really focused on the road trip scenario but that's an issue for city cars too.
Yes, useful at the personal level. I agree. But at the community level, emission reduction is most useful for cities.
Even still, people driving from the suburbs to the city are a large part of emissions. People living in the city are already likely to use transit for some trips and so are going to make less emissions. Also for emissions we really shouldn't separate the suburb from the city - they are too close to each other and so one affects the other.
People who live in cities often don't drive that much, so they don't need to charge that often - I drive like 400 km per month, meaning I'd have to charge once a month on most modern EVs.
Also even in the sprawl, people usually don't drive hundreds of kilometers s day.
Funnily enough, I’m a city dweller with street parking.
How many cities offer both abundant street parking and abundant charging stations?
We traveled 2000km+ through bigger cities like Brussels this summer alone with a BEV.
Parking during charging is often the only option. E.g. Gent even had parking only for rented BEVs and car sharing BEVs.
So, I don't know what you are talking about at all. There a restricted zones were you aren't even allowed to enter with an ICE.
Sorry, but how are these two related? What point are you trying to make? I live in the capital of a smaller European country and there's enough of both for it to be viable for me to own an EV. I believe it's the same in other larger cities and towns in the country (and smaller ones with malls or close to highways), then there's the weird gap of smaller towns that don't have enough chargers, but where many people live in apartment blocks with street parking, and then there's the countryside with small villages where people usually park in front of their house (and can charge at home easily).
I live in West Seattle and own an EV. There still is not enough easily accessible charging infrastructure, requiring users to constantly monitor and go out of their way to use the only level2 pole station available in the neighborhood.
The nearest level3 is off the peninsula and both are under repair.
The point is that charging infrastructure is still being built out. EV is not for everyone (yet)
> The point is that charging infrastructure is still being built out.
I know that EV infra generally sucks in the US, but don't people understand that more than 96% people on the planet live elsewhere? Often in places where EVs work just fine?
Most people are not fluent in English and not technically inclined. While I haven't seen real numbers I would expect a bit over half of the people here do live in the US.
> Sorry, but how are these two related?
I dunno. Ask the OP.