What’s Missing in the Electric-Vehicle Revolution: Enough Places to Plug In
As dozens of new battery-powered, plug-in car models come to market, roadtrippers who bought anything but a Tesla are discovering that America’s charging infrastructure isn’t ready for prime time
Bradley Wilkinson is the owner of a 2017 Chevrolet Bolt, and the kind of electric-vehicle diehard who knows how to squeeze every last mile of range out of his vehicle. Even so, during his most recent road trip, from Tampa, Florida, back home to Fort Carson, Colorado, he spent about 58 hours on the road. In a gasoline-powered vehicle, on average, the 1,900-mile journey would take about 30. His relatively sluggish pace was due to his need to regularly power up the Bolt’s battery at a “fast” charger — so called because they’re many times faster than typical home chargers.
Less experienced EV owners report far bigger inconveniences than Mr. Wilkinson’s. Those include: too few charging stations, too much demand at the stations that are available, broken chargers, confusing payment systems, exorbitant electricity rates, and uncertainty over how long their cars need to charge.
While EVs can be powered up at home, industry analysts and academics believe that a fast-charging infrastructure is essential to getting beyond their current limited adoption. This next wave of slightly-less-early adopters is critical to a global automotive industry betting heavily on battery power.
Yet so far, only one carmaker has offered a reassuring pitch about conveniently and reliably recharging on the go: Tesla. And Tesla’s fast-charging technology doesn’t work on non-Tesla cars.
Building the requisite charging infrastructure for the rest of the EV universe will be expensive.
The Biden administration has proposed building a network of 500,000 chargers in the next five years, which would cost billions. The fact that many believe such a government investment is required shows just how little faith many industry insiders have in the ability of private enterprise to solve this problem. One issue: Building out the nation’s charging infrastructure might not be profitable.
Say what you will about the fit and finish of Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s EVs, or his over-the-top promises of imminent self-driving technology, the one thing his company got right from its early days is charging, says Hemant K. Bhargava, director of the Center for Analytics and Technology at UC Davis.
Tesla built a nationwide fast-charging infrastructure for its vehicles even before its cars were widely adopted.
During the development and rollout of Tesla’s car-and-charger platform, the company offered to allow other companies to use the patents on its charging standards and equipment, but none took it up on the offer.
While Tesla offered “open source” charging technology, using it meant signing off on terms the world’s biggest automakers were unwilling to accept.
The world’s automakers collectively adopted a competing standard in the U.S., making their vehicles incompatible with Tesla’s. (Notably, the reverse isn’t true: With an adapter, Teslas can charge at nearly all fast-charging stations.)
In the automobile’s earliest days, motorists couldn’t always be sure a fueling station would be available when they needed it. But we no longer think about fuel availability when we shop for conventional cars.
In 2019, there were approximately 128,000 retail gas stations in the U.S. Adding up every kind of fast-charging station in the U.S., there are still only 4,890 of them, according to the Department of Energy.
Traditional car makers, with their sights set on a battery-only future, are aware of the charging problem.
One effort to match Tesla’s superchargers has resulted in Electrify America, a nationwide network of fastcharging stations. Its creator, Volkswagen, agreed to invest $2 billion as part of the settlement with the U.S. government and California over its Dieselgate emissions-testing scandal.
Other nationwide networks such as ChargePoint and EVGo, which primarily offer the slower sort of chargers, are now adding fast-charge technology. (The kind of charging that happens at home tops out at a maximum of 7.2 kw. Fast charging is 50kw and up.)
The result, for EV drivers who wish to take their vehicles on road trips — as well as the many city-dwelling EV owners who are unable to charge at home — is a patchwork of stations that many say is improving but still needs work.
In a survey of 3,500 EV drivers conducted in September and October 2020 by EV advocacy group Plug In America, more than half reported having problems with public charging. These problems were worse for respondents who drove non-Tesla vehicles; almost 60% of those reported issues. The most common complaint was a non-functional charger.
On a recent drive to Key West, Florida., from his home of Raleigh, North Carolina, Chris Maxwell found that out of 31 stops at fast chargers — all but one in the Electrify America network — one in five had problems, and were either completely inoperable or only charged at half their rated speed.
He was towing a heavy trailer, so he only got 120 miles per charge on his Audi e-tron SUV, hence all the stops.
Even with all the hiccups, the Electrify America network is far more reliable than it was even just a year ago, says Mr. Maxwell.
Also, charging stations, unlike gas stations, aren’t designed to accommodate cars with trailers.
“The charging station at Charlotte in particular is kind of the bane of my existence,” Mr. Maxwell says.
Because of its physical configuration, this station is a tricky place to charge a vehicle that has a trailer attached.
Think of Tesla, a vertically integrated platform in control of the technology in both its vehicles and chargers, like Apple, which controls everything from its microchips to its app store, says Prof. Bhargava.
The rest of the automakers are like the many manufacturers of Android phones, he says.
Only in the current charging environment, there’s no Google to direct all those manufacturers. For starters, each EV model’s battery can have a different capacity and charge time. In addition, every automaker must interpret a set of open standards for the plug type, charging protocols and payment methods.
Even when chargers are fully functional, issues can arise such as plugs becoming unseated, chargers rebooting, and cars and chargers having trouble communicating, all of which can interrupt a charging session or lead to longer charge times.
Robert Barrosa, senior director of sales and marketing at Electrify America, says his company registers every failed charging session initiated by a customer, and attempts to find patterns across different models of chargers and vehicles.
Many stakeholders — from automakers and charging companies to utilities and state and federal agencies — have an interest in a reliable national network of fast chargers, says Mark Wakefield, a managing director and automotive consultant at AlixPartners.
But if the sole source of income for these charging stations is from dispensing electricity, he adds, it doesn’t appear they’re a viable business.
According to an analysis AlixPartners conducted last year, the average fastcharging station, charging market price for electricity, would take 20 to 25 years to pay off its initial investment.
Part of the problem is that when in use, a single fast-charging stall can draw the equivalent of a whole neighborhood’s electricity needs. So it can be very expensive to connect a station with up to a dozen individual chargers to the local electrical grid, and secure enough energy supply.
Tesla offsets the cost of its fast-charging network through sales of vehicles and lucrative regulatory credits, and has only recently started turning a profit after years of losses. And Electrify America’s network was part of Volkswagen’s settlement.
But these two means of paying for a fast-charging network aren’t the only ones, says Katherine Stainken, policy director at Plug In America.
An alternative is to use the federal grant money from the Biden administration to encourage private businesses to set up, and partially fund, their own charging stations.
For example, a restaurant on an interstate or in an area with a high density of EVs could apply for funding, then chip in some of its own money, and perhaps also partner with a private fast-charging network company, in order to build a charging station. (The restaurant’s incentive would be that a fast charger could increase business while drivers wait.)
EVs currently make up around 2% of vehicles sold each year in the U.S., and the Department of Energy says more than 80% of EV charging happens at home.
More than half of Americans live in single-family dwellings where, in theory, an EV could be charged, and 63% of all U.S. housing units of every kind have a garage or carport.
But any EV owners planning a trip far from home, or who can’t charge at home, must rely on apps to plot an efficient route and ensure they don’t get stranded.
Chargeway, for instance, automatically calculates where drivers should stop on a given route in order to spend the least amount of time charging their vehicles.
The company gathers detailed information about how fast chargers can “fuel” any given vehicle — which depends both on the type of vehicle and the capacity of the charger, says Chargeway chief executive Matt Teske, a veteran of the auto industry.
Mr. Wilkinson, the Bolt driver, uses a similar, competing app, called A Better Route Planner.
The mindset required to make EV road trips, or even just drive an EV regularly if you can’t charge it at home, is markedly different from what Americans are used to. And that probably won’t change until we have a critical mass of charging stations.
“A gas-powered Mustang might get 350 miles to a tank,” says Mr. Teske, “but nobody talks about range anxiety in that vehicle.”
The world has about six years and 10 months left before its carbon budget — the amount of carbon dioxide that can be released into the atmosphere at the current rate — will be completely depleted. Unless human beings join hands to limit global warming under the 1.5C safe threshold, they will face worsening famines, disasters, and displacement. The climate clock by two artists, Gan Golan and Andrew Boyd, in Manhattan’s Union Square, is a stark reminder of how destructive and fragile we are.
While some deny the science of climate change, others are sounding a clarion call for action. In 2018, Greta Thunberg started protesting in front of the Swedish Parliament to keep up the pressure on her government to meet the target of carbon emissions. She skipped classes to strike every Friday and asked students around the world to join her, which had a ripple effect everywhere. Recently, the United States officially rejoined the Paris Agreement, an international accord to tackle global warming after US President Joe Biden signed an executive order last month and reversed Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the climate deal that came into force in 2016. The EU has set its sights on becoming carbon neutral by 2050.
Thailand is also stepping up efforts to resolve the climate crisis. In a recent forum titled “Invisible Waste: Lessons Learned To Combat Global Warming”, organised by the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET), many campaigners pushed for a circular economy — a model where resources are continually reused for the sustainable future of the planet — to reduce garbage and greenhouse gas emissions.
PREVENTING WASTE
Chaiyod Bunyagidj, vice-president of the Thai Sustainable Consumption and Production Network, said if temperatures continue to rise by 2C, the situation will reach the point of no return. The question then is how prepared are we as all of us are contributing to climate change.
“The world’s environmental sustainability is measured by its ecological footprint. It shows how much resources we use. Meanwhile, biocapacity can indicate how much resources our ecosystem can regenerate. It is like a piggy bank,” he said.
Chaiyod drew attention to data from 1961-2017 in the latest edition of the National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts 2021. It revealed that the world’s ecological footprint was 2.8 but its biocapacity was 1.6, leading to a deficit of 1.2. When it comes to Thailand, its ecological footprint was 2.6 but its biocapacity 1.2, meaning there is a deficit of 1.4.
“Have our National Economic and Social Development Plans created balance? If so, why are we ending up in the red? If it is business as usual, we will have to find two and a half new planets by 2050 because we won’t have enough resources,” he said.
In the current linear economy, goods are manufactured from raw materials, sold in large quantities, and thrown away. Overconsumption is fuelling the climate crisis due to greenhouse gas emissions from waste.
Suthat Ronglong, the founder and chief executive officer of Do in Thai Co Ltd, an information technology company, said the research by Joseph Poore and Thomas Nemecek shows food production accounts for 26% of greenhouse gas emissions (an equivalent of 400,000 nuclear bombs). About 6% of these emissions come from food waste and loss.
“The third target under the SDG12 (responsible consumption and production) calls for halving per capita food waste and reducing food loss by 2030. We should know how much food waste we generate. For example, can we plan the amount of food ahead of a party? How many orders do we place? How much food do we consume? How much is it left? Is it disposed of in landfills? If so, it will produce methane, which is 25 times more powerful than carbon dioxide [in terms of trapping heat],” he said.
Suthat stressed that source reduction is the most effective way of preventing waste. He is carrying out a food donation programme for those in need but the problem is that people are complacent about wasting food because they assume that leftovers will be given to the hungry.
“In light of this, we decided to track surplus food and informed people of what they discard. Instead of waiting for us, they should reduce food wastage from the start. Otherwise, we will become another trash can,” he said.
Suthat said rooftop farming developed on compost from food waste will be the way forward. As part of the circular economy model, people can walk to another rooftop and eat food that comes from the waste management system.
“It is the beauty of what we call compost,” he added.
Leftovers can be donated to feed hungry people or it can be diverted to feed animals and used for industrial or agricultural purposes. Landfill and incineration should be the last resort used.
REDEFINING WASTE
If human consumption inevitably generates waste, what else should we do? The statistics from the Thailand Environment Institute shows that the coronavirus outbreak increased the amount of plastic waste from 2.12 million tonnes in 2019 to 3.4 million tonnes in 2020, up by 62%. However, only 660,000 tonnes was recycled last year.
Many businesses are now turning garbage into something else. Somsak Borrisuttanakul, the chief executive officer of TPBI, said his staff has launched the “Won” campaign to sort and recycle plastic packages.
“The company has collaborated with many agencies and set up 400 drop-off points. So far, we have collected over 100,000kg of plastic. It is recycled into reusable plastic bags and upcycled into other products. Plastic can be transformed into something of value,” he said.
The “Care The Whale” project can serve as another textbook example of waste management for the circular economy. Noppakao Sucharitakul, executive vice-president of SET, said the campaign seeks to make use of materials to the very end.
“How can we make trash disappear before it ends up in a whale’s stomach?
Previously, there have been reports about dead whales with rubbish inside. We joined hands with organisations on Ratchadaphisek Road and calculated the reduced carbon footprint. Last year, we reduced 4.27 million kilogrammes of carbon dioxide [equal to planting 474,277 mature trees],” she said.
Imagination can make a huge difference in tackling waste. Wishulada Panthanuvong, the social activist artist, is working with local people in Nonthaburi’s Bang Yai district to create works of art from rubbish. One of them is a whale sculpture made of plastic waste and other leftovers in herstudio. It can absorb over 1,000kg of carbon dioxide equivalents.
“It can show the magnitude of waste normally measured in numbers and raise public awareness,” she said.
CALL FOR PUBLIC COOPERATION
Given the situation, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Varawut Silpa-archa said even if the whole country is turned into a forest, it can’t offset its carbon emissions of around 350 million tonnes per year. In the 20-year national strategy (2017-37), the government plans to increase forest land from 31.6% to 40%, but that will only help absorb only 100 million tonnes.
Varawut, however, affirmed Thailand’s commitment to the Paris Agreement. It passed the first phase of reducing its nationally determined contributions (NDCs) by 7-15% and is now entering the second phase of cutting NDCs by 20-25% in energy, logistics, and industry sectors.
“Prime Minister Prayut is pushing for the bio, circular and green (BCG) economy. In the past, it was just corporate social responsibility but now it is gaining traction from many private companies. However, some aren’t falling in line. If we enforce this policy, it will speed up our transition to the BCG,” he said.
He said the implementation of environmental policies requires public cooperation. If people don’t follow them, they will be only “letters on paper”. Tackling environmental problems takes as much time as causing them.
HOW CAN WE MAKE TRASH DISAPPEAR BEFORE IT ENDS UP IN A WHALE’S STOMACH?
Almost 9,000 illustration works by illustrators and artists from Thailand and overseas will be showcased digitally during the “Bangkok Illustration Fair 2021 (BKKIF)”, which kicks off tomorrow and runs until Sunday.
Hailed as the biggest gathering of illustrators and art lovers in Thailand, the fair is organised by Happening, a media group, in collaboration with What If, a professional event organiser, and designer/curator Decembell. It features both an online exhibition and offline activities.
This is the first opportunity to explore, free of charge, up to 4,690 fanciful works from the portfolios of 469 illustrators and artists from 12 countries, plus an additional 4,000 pieces by 150 candidates who have been selected in the final round as “BKKIF Artists 2021”.
Among the 150 BKKIF artists, 135 are from Thailand as well as Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Australia, the Netherlands and the US.
Viewers can support the artists by purchasing their items directly. They are also invited to vote for their favourite artists and get a chance to win the BKKIF 2021: Collection Book which compiles at least one artwork from the 150 BKKIF artists. It will be available for purchase at 350 baht.
Meanwhile, invited reviewers from many countries will explore BKKIF artists’ portfolios, give comments, and pick some outstanding artists to work further with. They will also grant their favourite artists special rewards.
For illustrator wannabes, there will also be the “Bangkok Illustration Fair Talk: Begin” where 10 of the country’s professional artists and illustrators will be sharing their experiences and lessons from when they started.
The speakers include ML Chiratorn Chirapravati, Arut Tantasirin (creator of Warbie Yama), Sa-ard, Yoon Phannapast, Caracasan, Yuree Kensaku, Juli Baker and Summer, Riety, Jiranarong, and Jackkrit Anantakul (HelloiamJK).
The talk will be held at the Auditorium, 5th floor of Bangkok Art and Culture Centre, Pathumwan intersection, on Saturday, at 10am. Tickets cost 570 baht including a free postcard set and snacks. Seats are limited. It will also be live-streamed via Facebook: BKKIF, with an admission fee of 270 baht. Reservations can be made via happeningandfriends.com.