WetEV said:
SageBrush said:
GRA is manufacturing a "problem." When that changes, MUD owners will install EV charging. It really is that simple.
Mostly true.
New high end apartments are already providing charging for residents.
Consider that the outlet for charging is similar cost to an electric dryer hookup. Most apartments, other than the cheapest, provide washer and dryer hookup in the apartment. Many of the cheapest provide coin operated washer/dryers. The very very cheapest don't provide any of this. Or very very old/historic.
How does GRA wash and dry his shirts?
Long enough term, I'd expect most apartments to provide charging as part of rent, at least at the outlet level, with perhaps a charge for electric power. The cheaper ones will provide pay by the hour or kWh charging. Yes, there will be a few that don't get any charging or for that matter parking.
What's being ignored is the reason "Very few Apt renters want an EV (so) for now" - it's because they don't have anywhere to charge (price and range are the other major factors). Even here in the U.S., 40% of the population lives in MUDs. Elsewhere the percentage is higher. That lack of charging infrastructure is cited in every survey as one of the top three or four reasons people haven't gotten a PEV isn't
manufacturing a problem, it's recognizing that it is one that must be solved before PEVs generally and BEVs especially will be acceptable to the majority of consumers.
As apartments, condos and townhomes tend to be located in urban areas where distances are shorter (and pollution's worse), PEVs are most potentially valuable to MUD dwellers, absent better urban design and high quality public transit. That the problem will eventually be solved in the long-term as new MUDs are built with charging isn't going to be adequate to solve the critical need in the short- and medium-term, as housing stock tends to last for a century, which is why we need QCs at places like grocery and drug stores, fast food restaurants, etc., and lots more L2 at workplaces where installing it tends to be less expensive, so that MUD dwellers can see PEVs as a practical option.
As to how I wash and dry my shirts, electric washing machine and a clothesline. I do share the washer and a (gas) dryer with the main house, although I don't use the latter, and in any case the dual outlet in the garage/laundry room is occupied by the L1 plugs for the washer and dryer. Charging from either would require an extension cord, as well as inconvenience on the part of both of us to plug and unplug, given our differing schedules. And since both are coin-operated, feeding money into one and losing it because it's unplugged would quickly lead to neighbor warfare. :roll: My other option is an L1 extension cord from my place out a door or window. not an option during the (gas) heating season.
Just to check my memory, I walked over last night to the one MUD in my neighborhood with a (dual) outdoor outlet. The apartment and its parking span the area between two side streets, so there's parking lots on both sides, 14 spaces one side and 7 on the other. 7 of the spaces are in carports with apartments over them, so if the spaces correspond to the apartments you could theoretically use an extension cord and charge L1, assuming you were willing to leave the window open during the heating season (gas, almost certainly). The one outlet is in one of the carports, and assuming it's wired as 20A total, you could charge 2 cars at a max. of 8A each, so at most 9 of 21 spaces, but really just 7.
The remaining spaces are too far away and SoL, as are all those cars which park on the street. And this is the MUD with the
best[/b] charging opportunities in my neighborhood. The rest have essentially zero options, not even an extension cord out a window.
I haven't lived in an MUD for a couple of decades, but as a general rule you're limited to jury-rigged L1, and you're lucky if you've got that. Barring requiring landlords to undertake expensive retrofits for charging, which would be a political lead balloon even here at least for now, we can't afford to wait until new MUDs with charging facilities replace all the existing stock, so we need options to make ZEVs practical for all much sooner: lots more QCs and workplace L2s, and/or FCEVs. I don't see bio/synfuels playing a major role given their likely very limited production, but they'd obviously be easiest given existing infrastructure.