Rav4 EV owner funded CHAdeMO's, SBA to SJC

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TonyWilliams

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 14, 2012
Messages
4,131
Location
San Diego county, California USA
snoltor said:
25 million would give us 500 CHAdeMO stations if they were $50,000 each. They could be spaced along some of the major highways as you mention. I know a guy who works with CARB on biofuels and the CARB employees that he knows tell him that battery electrics are a fad that will end in 2 years and then hydrogen will take over. So if that attitude is pervasive in CARB there's your answer.

tgreene said:
Who has planned this? Seems pretty stupid to me: we need a quick charging infrastructure along popular driving routes in the state to make electric cars more practical for people.

The states of Oregon and Washington get this and have already built the West Coast Electric Highway.

http://www.oregon.gov/ODOT/HWY/OIPP/docs/WCEH_brochure.pdf

Building the WCEH through California has always been a goal of the BC2BC http://www.AllElectricVehicleRally.org.

One idea just popped into my mind:

What if we developed a fund for putting in the the several CHAdeMO chargers needed to complete a trip in a CHAdeMO equipped car with over 100 mile range between Santa Barbara and San Jose, California.

It's about 300 miles from Santa Barbara to San Jose, so a minimum of two charger locations would be required. It's probable that Nissan would donate the chargers.

The funds raised would be for installation.
 
You might have good luck with the city of San Luis Obispo, there are many free chargers in town, used one today. The next 100 miles are up in the air, King City? I know that the Nissan dealer in SLO is also the same owner of the Nissan dealer in salinas. May be worth talking to both of them. Also in the central coast Robobank has been EV friendly, there is the tesla supercharger in there's parking lot in Atascadero, but that is 120 miles from SB. There is also a 70amp L2 in the same location.
 
Great idea. I wonder if that approach would also work in trying to connect Northern CA with the QC network in Oregon. 200 miles from Ashland to the Chico Nissan dealership, 300 miles from Ashland to the Vacaville QC.

TonyWilliams said:
What if we developed a fund for putting in the the several CHAdeMO chargers needed to complete a trip in a CHAdeMO equipped car with over 100 mile range between Santa Barbara and San Jose, California.

It's about 300 miles from Santa Barbara to San Jose, so a minimum of two charger locations would be required. It's probable that Nissan would donate the chargers.

The funds raised would be for installation.
 
TonyWilliams said:
Building the WCEH through California has always been a goal of the BC2BC http://www.AllElectricVehicleRally.org.

One idea just popped into my mind:

What if we developed a fund for putting in the the several CHAdeMO chargers needed to complete a trip in a CHAdeMO equipped car with over 100 mile range between Santa Barbara and San Jose, California.

It's about 300 miles from Santa Barbara to San Jose, so a minimum of two charger locations would be required. It's probable that Nissan would donate the chargers.

The funds raised would be for installation.
San Luis Obispo and Soledad are the perfect spacing. Coast Nissan, SLO is a natural place if Nissan is going to donate the charger. QCs at dealers frequently have issues, but it seems the easiest way. Soledad is more problematic. The only natural place is the string of services right off the freeway. There should be a Freedom Station here - meaning that there needs to be L2 co-located with any DCQC installation. There are no L2 chargers shown on PlugShare between King City and Salinas.
 
I'm definitely looking forward to Tony's JdeMO system for my RAV4 EV, whether it's "cheaper to drive my ICE" or not. The reason I bought the RAV4 and leased a LEAF back in 2011 was to get away from ICE vehicles as quickly and conveniently as possible. I hope I'll never need to buy an ICE ever again.

As a biz dev (sales) guy, my territory runs along the Western side of the Cascade Mountains from the Canadian Border (Whatcom County) to Grays Harbor County which includes Kurt Cobain's birthplace, Aberdeen WA . One way to Aberdeen from my house is 125 miles, but I can't drive it because there is no way to get home unless I stay over night. I'm currently in discussions with various public officials and the utility there about getting some L2's and L3 's up and running ASAP. They're very interested as they don't have a single system other than L1 outlets. A QC anywhere in that area makes it within easy range of a bunch of charger options in the Olympia/Tacoma area and the trip becomes an EV trip, not a TDI trip. North South along the I-5 corridor is not a problem for L3, but heading West to the coast/rainforest/Olympic Mountains and setting of the Twilight books/movies is a huge problem.

Can't wait to see/hear about the prototype as it gets closer to completion!
 
TonyWilliams said:
What if we developed a fund for putting in the the several CHAdeMO chargers needed to complete a trip in a CHAdeMO equipped car with over 100 mile range between Santa Barbara and San Jose, California.

It's about 300 miles from Santa Barbara to San Jose, so a minimum of two charger locations would be required. It's probable that Nissan would donate the chargers.

The funds raised would be for installation.
snoltor said:
Great idea. I wonder if that approach would also work in trying to connect Northern CA with the QC network in Oregon. 200 miles from Ashland to the Chico Nissan dealership, 300 miles from Ashland to the Vacaville QC.
Chico is quite a bit off I-5. The Shasta area creates an issue for site selection. I think Yreka - Redding - Williams is good spacing even though Yreka is close to Ashland. You could make if from Wolf Creek to Yreka and skip the ones in between.
 
I'm curious how open Nissan will be to charging Toyotas.... I'm guessing not most of the time. The Nissan dealer QC here in Davis is gated and closed after hours. But there is a free (for the time being at least) 24 h access QC at the Mondavi Center in Davis. Gets a lot of business. I look forward to using it!

miimura said:
Chico is quite a bit off I-5.
 
The car dealer model of public refueling stations is poor. Counting on a Toyota dealer, let alone a competing brand of car dealer like Nissan for your recharging needs is not sustainable.

NRG / eVgo will not be building these units outside the required areas (which is not SBA to SJC).

I'm pretty well versed on DC quick charging, and am part owner of one of the busiest CHAdeMO chargers in the USA, located at a Marriott property (Residence Inn) in San Juan Capistrano and the first DC charger on the ChargePoint network.

So, this issue will likely be ongoing until some cash shows up. These remote locations will rarely be used, so the concept is somewhat similar to the Tesla Roadster 70 amp AC installations at Rabobanks in Goleta (Santa Barbara), Atascadero and Salinas.

What's different is that those 70 amp Clipper Creek units were donated by Tesla, and cost maybe $1000 to install. Rabobank handles the ongoing electricity costs.

This concept, even with free chargers from Nissan, requires big money to install. It could be $10k to $50k per installation. We need at least two.

So, the simple question is how do we get that money. Please don't say some government handout. That's not going to happen.
 
miimura said:
snoltor said:
Great idea. I wonder if that approach would also work in trying to connect Northern CA with the QC network in Oregon. 200 miles from Ashland to the Chico Nissan dealership, 300 miles from Ashland to the Vacaville QC.
Chico is quite a bit off I-5. The Shasta area creates an issue for site selection. I think Yreka - Redding - Williams is good spacing even though Yreka is close to Ashland. You could make if from Wolf Creek to Yreka and skip the ones in between.

I think if the shorter and busier SBA to SJC route can be powered with CHAdeMO, then the far less busy and far longer stretch from Sacto to Ashland, Oregon can be attempted.
 
For funding these stations, you may want to consider private charitable foundations that have a focus on the environment. Perhaps Packard Foundation, Doris Duke foundation, Kresge foundation. The latter has a clean freight initiative. Perhaps we can submit the grant as a group. Not much money for a big communal good. Just what they like.
 
TonyWilliams said:
So, the simple question is how do we get that money. Please don't say some government handout. That's not going to happen.

Agreed. I think that it will be critical to implement a segment and have people use it for real long distance EV travel. Once that happens, then we can publicize this success to pressure the state into some additional intelligent implementations. But we need a success first. We all agree that SBA to SJC would be really good, but that will take a good number of stations. Is there anything less ambitious that would also serve this purpose?
 
tgreene said:
Is there anything less ambitious that would also serve this purpose?

No matter where you put them, the single largest cost is typically the install.

I think we can install just two CHAdeMO stations between SBA and SJC, and call it the California West Coast Electric Highway. That's how you get the state's attention.

I have been hounding every body from the governor's office on down to get some money for this project. CEC keeps handing out cash for lots of things except this, but if CARB (and CEC) are convinced that electrics are a fad, it just isn't going to happen.

So, like so many things in life, we need benefactors who will donate a total of $50k - $100k. It's just that simple. I will likely match contributions in some percentage because I really want to see it get done.

The equal distance points from Goleta (where there is a current CHAdeMO) is

Between Arroyo Grande & San Luis Obispo
Between King City & Soledad
 
Hmmm
Other options
http://techcrunch.com/2014/06/09/tesla-wants-to-open-its-supercharger-standard-to-other-electric-car-makers/?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000591
 
SeattleRav4 said:
Hmmm
Other options
http://techcrunch.com/2014/06/09/tesla-wants-to-open-its-supercharger-standard-to-other-electric-car-makers/?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000591

Interesting, but I think the industry won't likely buy off on this, "Musk said he’d be willing to open up the designs in order to build a standard that can be used interchangeably across the industry ".

We have so many charge standards simply because nobody that matters (big wigs at big auto manufacturers) wants interchangeability. I just don't see GM or BMW giving up on Frankenplug, and I don't see world leader Nissan abandoning CHAdeMO to play second place to Tesla.

Something to watch, though!
 
A few thoughts.

We all seem to agree that we will need to raise visibility and cash for completing a segment of a functional EV charging network for long distance travel in CA. There may be some potential donors, but they need to hear about this grassroots initiative.

How about if we work toward drafting a press release making a few points:
- Several EVs have DC fast-charging capability
- Current and planned fast charging stations in CA are in the metro areas only. Might want to say something about WA and OR already having intelligent "EV highways" but CA has ignored long-distance EV travel.
- Adding just a few stations along 101 would enable long distance EV travel between LA and the Bay Area, extending from San Diego to Sacramento and beyond with the existing network.
- We have formed a group that is looking for donors and / or investors to make this happen

I bet that blogs like Green Car Reports, CleanTechnica, and maybe others would publish this. Sometimes Yahoo and Google News (electric cars section) pick these up from the blogs. Might be easier to reach potential partners with an announcement like this.

Nissan is a big potential partner as we have discussed. Seems like this will become more important to them given their increasing number of Leaf sales and their announcement that future Leaf models will / may have a variety of (larger) battery packs available. We may have some value to NISSAN if we are an independent group advocating for chargers for all EVs. I suspect that Nissan could help us push this to CA Government agencies too.

Comments?
 
tgreene said:
We may have some value to NISSAN if we are an independent group advocating for chargers for all EVs. I suspect that Nissan could help us push this to CA Government agencies too.

Comments?

All great ideas, however I do somewhat know the folks at Nissan who are actually handing out the DC chargers (and the company that I'm associated with, EVOasis, has already gotten several free DC chargers from Nissan).

They aren't too keen on either of the areas that we are looking at, plus those chargers are relatively cheap and not particularly durable.

So, if we could get free ones from Nissan, awesome, but it's not a done deal. You have to budget to buy them, and a good one costs money.
 
Is Nissan going to be so receptive if the plan is to install every 100 miles? None of the US cars with a CHAdeMO port built-in can go that distance. Placing chargers at Leaf-friendly distances is more difficult because you need 4 or 5 instead of 2. I figure you need Santa Maria - Paso Robles - King City - Salinas and maybe Gilroy to make it from Goleta to San Jose.
 
miimura said:
Is Nissan going to be so receptive if the plan is to install every 100 miles? None of the US cars with a CHAdeMO port built-in can go that distance. Placing chargers at Leaf-friendly distances is more difficult because you need 4 or 5 instead of 2. I figure you need Santa Maria - Paso Robles - King City - Salinas and maybe Gilroy to make it from Goleta to San Jose.

Well, like I said up stream, Nissan isn't keen on any chargers in this area. So, it won't matter if it's 10 miles or 100 miles if Nissan isn't part of the picture.

If they aren't, we need two locations minimum that we have to buy. If they are, I would split the difference and make 4 chargers cover about 45-50 miles each.

It all falls back to, "how much money can we raise?". I'm not sure LEAF owners would pitch it much, so I wouldn't plan on having the system built to handle those cars.
 
TonyWilliams said:
Well, like I said up stream, Nissan isn't keen on any chargers in this area. So, it won't matter if it's 10 miles or 100 miles if Nissan isn't part of the picture.

If they aren't, we need two locations minimum that we have to buy. If they are, I would split the difference and make 4 chargers cover about 45-50 miles each.

It all falls back to, "how much money can we raise?". I'm not sure LEAF owners would pitch it much, so I wouldn't plan on having the system built to handle those cars.

OK. The biggest seller of CHAdeMO cars in the US is not interested in chargers in this corridor, and their current vehicles do not have enough range to work with a minimum number of charging stations. RAV4 EV owners alone can't fund this unless hundreds contribute over $1000 each just for the installation.

Who does that leave to fund this? The answer isn't obvious, and we may have to cast a pretty wide net to find out. It would be good to get some input from other EV industry people, trade groups, state agencies, and maybe others with a stake or influence in this game.

Does anybody know anything about the West Coast Green Highway association that provides info on the Washington / Oregon system? Could they help us? Is there a CHAdeMO industry group that could help us make connections?
 
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