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hyperlexis said:
scottf200 said:
hyperlexis said:
Has anyone had any luck recently signing up for a CharJit card, to use the area's L3 chargers?
350Green is running the show and is supposedly being taken over by CarCharging.com.... But no one has ever called me back re getting a CharJit card for the L3 machines.
Is everything still in limbo?
On going disaster. Just saw this in todays paper.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-0428-350-green-suit--20130428,0,6893789.story" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Feud over electric-car charging stations
2 companies claim agreements to take over 350Green project in Chicago

By Julie Wernau, Chicago Tribune reporter
April 28, 2013

Two companies are battling in court to take over Chicago's electric-vehicle charging stations, which are less than two-thirds complete amid a backlog of unpaid bills and a federal probe into payments to vendors.

JNS Holdings Corp. in Arlington Heights and Miami Beach-based Car Charging Group both claim in court documents to have agreements with 350Green to take over the Chicago project. California-based 350Green had been building Chicago's network of charging stations by tapping into $1.9 million in state and federal funds under a grant agreement with the city.

At stake beyond the charging stations are potentially lucrative business arrangements with national retailers such as Walgreen Co. and Simon Property Group, a mall operator, on whose property some stations are located.

Competition in the charging station industry is intense because companies that enter early enough to win over national retailers can also win primary market share across the U.S., said Rosanna Garcia, associate professor of innovation at the D'Amore-McKim School of Business at Northeastern University. The Chicago project had been used by 350Green to try to expand into 20 other markets.

"Although the charging stations themselves are quite expensive, the return on investment can be quite good if a company is the primary provider of units around a city or a country," said Garcia. Station owners, she said, are charging $1 to $5 for 15 minutes of charging when average electric costs amount to only 50 cents per hour to charge a car.

The Tribune reported earlier this month that work on Chicago's charging stations was halted after the Chicago Department of Transportation, which oversaw the grant agreement with 350Green, said it found "discrepancies in vendor payments" from 350Green.

Hundreds of pages of documents obtained by the Tribune under the Freedom of Information Act show that 350Green submitted copies of checks to the city to receive state and federal grant money, checks that some contractors told the Tribune they hadn't received. Several said they were contacted by the FBI.

One of the most curious checks, for $1.9 million, was written to an entity called Actium Power, which on its invoice said it was the "exclusive North American dealer" for Efacec USA, maker of fast-charging stations. An Efacec executive told the Tribune that Efacec has no exclusive dealers, has had no dealings with Actium Power and that the prices listed on paperwork provided to the city by 350Green were about double what Efacec charges.

Tim Mason, 350Green's president and co-founder, has said the issues cited by the city were "clerical errors."

The status of the investigation isn't clear; an FBI spokeswoman declined to comment.

The Chicago Department of Transportation had no immediate comment Friday on the lawsuits. The two companies need to resolve the litigation quickly if either one of them hopes to collect the remaining grant money because Chicago's grant agreement expires at the end of this year.

According to its original proposal, 350Green envisioned that by now its charging stations would be serving 12,000 electric vehicles in the Chicago metro area, each paying $50 to $70 per month for charging.

Instead, there are only 441 electric vehicles in the Chicago metro area, according to research firm Edmunds.com. Moreover, some electric vehicle owners have not embraced public charging stations.

For example, Martin Howard, who lives in Mount Prospect, routinely drives 40 miles to work and back in his Nissan Leaf electric and said he has used a public charger only once in the 16 months he's owned the vehicle.

"I think most people who use or plan to use an electric car have access to a private garage where they can charge," Howard said. "I can't imagine anyone buying or leasing an electric car and planning to use public charging stations. I consider public charging an emergency situation."

Still, some people in the auto industry believe that once battery technology is improved, there will be a bright future for electric vehicles — and therefore the charging industry.

Car Charging Group and JNS Holdings, both thinly traded public firms, apparently believe there is a future in charging. Both claim 350Green signed deals to hand over Chicago's charging stations.

In a case filed April 10 in U.S. District Court in New York, Car Charging Group sued 350Green and JNS Holdings in an attempt to block the charging stations from moving over to Illinois-based JNS.

In the meantime, JNS said it signed a deal with 350Green to acquire the Chicago charging stations. In court documents, JNS said it signed a deal April 17 with 350Green to assume $1.6 million in liabilities stemming from unpaid contractor bills related to the stalled project. Car Charging Group said it too had a deal — signed in March — to take over the Chicago project and 350Green's assets in 19 other markets.

On Tuesday, Car Charging Group withdrew its complaint in New York, saying that it had settled the matter with 350Green out of court.

But left out of the settlements, according to court documents, was JNS Holdings. Last week it said it had been meeting with Chicago Department of Transportation officials to negotiate the takeover of 350Green's severed $1.9 million grant agreement after successfully negotiating a deal with 350Green.

On Thursday, Car Charging Group filed a complaint in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Illinois against JNS Holdings saying that under the terms of a settlement it forged with 350Green two days earlier it now owns "all of the interests of 350 Green," including the Chicago charging stations.

Any agreement 350Green signed with JNS should be declared null and void, Car Charging Group said in court documents.

As an electrical contractor, JNS installed 41 percent of the 168 chargers built so far and is owed about $160,000 by 350Green, according to court documents.

New York Attorney Randall Newman, who represented JNS in the New York suit, called Car Charging Group's complaints "frivolous" and said JNS will fight to hold on to the Chicago project.

JNS has agreed to pay contractors half of what is owed and to finish the project, which is a year and half late in being completed and 106 charging stations short of its obligations under Chicago's grant agreement.

Car Charging Group has not indicated what it would offer contractors and did not return calls. JNS' agreement is contingent upon the city's approving the transfer of the grant agreement it originally forged with 350Green in late 2010.


OMG this is a disaster. And the part about the vendors charging vastly more than the cost of the actual electricity used is absolutely outrageous. Price gouging pure and simple. Whoever in the government who thinks that this kind of private vendor based system makes sense is insane. Those kind of charging prices seem to cost far more than the equivalent amounts of gasoline! And most people in the city need those public stations because folks have no access to a charger in 99% of multiunit residential parking garages (at least not yet) or if they only have street parking access. And cities are exactly the best place for EVs to be used! Why the hell are they inteviewing some suburbanite with a nice house and a garage? He can just go home to his nice garage every night and plug in. So why would he care about anyone but himself, and dismiss the need for public charging. Why not ask a city person what he thinks about not having so few working L3 (or L2) public chargers for his EV!

The state or the city needs to get on the ball and fix this -- we need accessible, affordable pubic chargers, and the sooner the better. In fact, why cant the city put them in themselves, and offer free charging? At least for now, with so few EVs on the road?

If Mayor Emmanuel really does care about making the city a hub of EV development, the city should allow free street parking for EV drivers. That would kick start things really, really fast. (Although with the parking meter company --another disaster-- I wonder if we even have the power to do so....).


Everyone seems to be doing "duck and cover," not wanting to get their hands dirty...if they aren't already...

Environment? Are you kidding? Just look at the hype about the new muscle cars that are all a rave. Tragic to see this in the auto section of the news papers. Not a word about the "2011" car of the year. Buried it seems to be. Can't even find the person in charge of the EV development in the State of IL. "Who's trying to kill the electric cars?"

We seem to be in a dark hole in this part of the country.
 
scottf200 said:
So I have friends/neighbors I talked to yesterday who read these articles and immediately equated it to the WHOLE EV industry!


I think this attitude comes from "hidden shame."

They just can't comprehend driving anything other than an ICE vehicle and don't want to see what will be common place within a few years.

I notice that many people will look the other way when they see me approaching in the Leaf. I found that very strange at first, but have come to realize "they don't want to see it."

Living in one's illusions are always more comfortable, thus the negative comments.
 
I wrote to the City of Chicago about the 350.green issue and received a reply, but don't know how to post it to this page.

I could email their reply to someone and perhaps they could post the response?
 
greengate said:
scottf200 said:
So I have friends/neighbors I talked to yesterday who read these articles and immediately equated it to the WHOLE EV industry!
I think this attitude comes from "hidden shame." They just can't comprehend driving anything other than an ICE vehicle and don't want to see what will be common place within a few years. I notice that many people will look the other way when they see me approaching in the Leaf. I found that very strange at first, but have come to realize "they don't want to see it." Living in one's illusions are always more comfortable, thus the negative comments.
Not everyone thinks that way. People also want a dependable car that works the same way in the winter and summer. As well as when people have a 'perfectly good ICE' they don't need a new car payment. The illusions work both ways.
 
greengate said:
I wrote to the City of Chicago about the 350.green issue and received a reply, but don't know how to post it to this page.

I could email their reply to someone and perhaps they could post the response?

I'm very interested in the reply. Are you able to copy it from your e-mail and then paste it here? Also I called Charjit today, and they said that they are still able to add charge sessions to cards and that CarCharging will be taking this on next. When I asked if Car Charging would be taking over (instead of JNS), they weren't sure. Very strange!
 
brianchi73 said:
greengate said:
I wrote to the City of Chicago about the 350.green issue and received a reply, but don't know how to post it to this page.

I could email their reply to someone and perhaps they could post the response?

I'm very interested in the reply. Are you able to copy it from your e-mail and then paste it here? Also I called Charjit today, and they said that they are still able to add charge sessions to cards and that CarCharging will be taking this on next. When I asked if Car Charging would be taking over (instead of JNS), they weren't sure. Very strange!

----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, May 02, 2013 08:40 AM
To: Weigert, Karen
Subject: Re: Comments : 350green.org

Thank you Karen for the reply.

I am very pleased to see that Chicago continues to be supportive of this technology.

May I share your response with like minded friends?

I know that they too will be encouraged by the information contained in your reply.

Sincerely,

Tom Wallace
On May 1, 2013, at 5:18 PM, "Weigert, Karen" <[email protected]> wrote:

Hello,

Thanks for your note. The City of Chicago is a leader among US cities in encouraging the development of a robust local EV market. The City's EV goals are highlighted in Sustainable Chicago 2015, the City's sustainability roadmap. With the assistance of federal and state funds, the City was able to incent the installation of over 168 public charging stations, including 26 DC Fast Chargers, throughout the Chicago region. This program has been a game charger for the Chicago region and an important program for the City. We are closely monitoring the situation with the parties involved and will take appropriate actions to ensure the City's goals for the program are attained.

Mayor Emanuel and his staff will continue to aggressively advance the local EV market by identifying and addressing barriers to EV adoption and developing innovative incentive programs when feasible

Thanks again

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Saturday, April 13, 2013 5:18 PM
To: CITYFEEDBACK
Subject: Comments : 350green.org

Name: Tom Wallace
I read in The Chicago Tribune about the failure of the vehicle electrification program, which was an EXCELLENT program and I hope that you will seriously work to keep it from dying on the vine. There is no cleaner fuel than electricity. If you have a network in place, people will gladly come to Chicago. I hope the 350 green people are held accountable for any fraud. It's in your best interest to see that this happens.
 
On the oasis charging stations... the issue has never been that they are on in the physical sense. Indeed they appear to be functioning fine until you waive your Charge Point / Car Charging fob to find it does nothing and call the number on the screen to have nobody answer. Unless you were lucky enough to get a Charjit card a balance on it before 350green skipped town, you're SOL.

The L2 chargers in the city mostly seem to be working fine but there are just way too many of them especially in residential areas outside of the loop. This is the problem with government grants... There is absolutely no incentive to make smart decisions about where when and how to spend the money. It would have made far more sense to put a sprinkling of them and then hang on to the cash to see where there is demand and add more. And yes, Im aware that the market *might eventually* grow into it, but keep in mind that these devices have a limited life and most people are electing to charge at home, especially with third party EVSEs becoming competitive.

Whoever said that charging stations are gouging, think about this some more. Stations take a lot of money to build. Then they need to be maintained. Leases for the space need to be paid, or an attractive cut of the profits needs to go the the space owner (requiring higher rates). The electricity cost is the least of their concern.
 
Sledge said:
On the oasis charging stations... the issue has never been that they are on in the physical sense. Indeed they appear to be functioning fine until you waive your Charge Point / Car Charging fob to find it does nothing and call the number on the screen to have nobody answer. Unless you were lucky enough to get a Charjit card a balance on it before 350green skipped town, you're SOL.

The L2 chargers in the city mostly seem to be working fine but there are just way too many of them especially in residential areas outside of the loop. This is the problem with government grants... There is absolutely no incentive to make smart decisions about where when and how to spend the money. It would have made far more sense to put a sprinkling of them and then hang on to the cash to see where there is demand and add more. And yes, Im aware that the market *might eventually* grow into it, but keep in mind that these devices have a limited life and most people are electing to charge at home, especially with third party EVSEs becoming competitive.

Whoever said that charging stations are gouging, think about this some more. Stations take a lot of money to build. Then they need to be maintained. Leases for the space need to be paid, or an attractive cut of the profits needs to go the the space owner (requiring higher rates). The electricity cost is the least of their concern.


I'm well aware of the costs in addition to those of the electrical usage. It's not to be overlooked or taken for granted, I agree.

However; most, if not all, were placed via a subsidy and it is a capital expense that's written off anyway.

But more importantly, it's about giving something back to the community and for the good of the commons and society of which we are all a part of that seems to fall short on these occasions where their intended purpose is to create an additional revenue stream.

This was my motivation for buying a Leaf in the first place. My give back does not come via the tail pipe. Hopefully more will feel the same!!
 
Whether or not the initial capex was subsidized doesn't matter much; the equipment still has a limited lifespan. This means that in addition to paying for the electricity, space/lease, administration, transaction fees, and the thousands of other "little things" required to bring you charging service, the company needs also needs to stash away some profits to replace/repair that charging station when needed.

A write-off doesn't make an investment free, it just means you don't pay taxes on profits up to that amount, provided they ever come.

A little math shows you that the $2.00 an hour is not really that unreasonable:
The credit card processor is going to take 5% of that right off the top, leaving us with $1.90
With the smaller 3.3KWh charger, you'll use about $.53 of electricity (3.3 * commercial service @ $.16/KWh
That leaves about $1.37 per hour (of which they get paid for very few because there is presently little demand) in gross profit to cover everything else.

And who, specifically, do you think should be "giving something back to the community"? Sure you can't mean 350Green, Charge Point, etc, or their contractors - would you ask them to work for free? Or do you mean that IL taxpayers should be "giving back" to a subset of other taxpayers (EV owners)? This seems like a reverse transfer payment to me - would you ask that poor people pay income and sales tax in order to further subsidize your $30K+ electric car?
 
Sledge said:
Whether or not the initial capex was subsidized doesn't matter much; the equipment still has a limited lifespan. This means that in addition to paying for the electricity, space/lease, administration, transaction fees, and the thousands of other "little things" required to bring you charging service, the company needs also needs to stash away some profits to replace/repair that charging station when needed.

A write-off doesn't make an investment free, it just means you don't pay taxes on profits up to that amount, provided they ever come.

A little math shows you that the $2.00 an hour is not really that unreasonable:
The credit card processor is going to take 5% of that right off the top, leaving us with $1.90
With the smaller 3.3KWh charger, you'll use about $.53 of electricity (3.3 * commercial service @ $.16/KWh
That leaves about $1.37 per hour (of which they get paid for very few because there is presently little demand) in gross profit to cover everything else.

And who, specifically, do you think should be "giving something back to the community"? Sure you can't mean 350Green, Charge Point, etc, or their contractors - would you ask them to work for free? Or do you mean that IL taxpayers should be "giving back" to a subset of other taxpayers (EV owners)? This seems like a reverse transfer payment to me - would you ask that poor people pay income and sales tax in order to further subsidize your $30K+ electric car?

No. It's about cultivating a spirit of generosity.

As a culture this has been lost for the most part as we have increasingly become a me society as opposed to a we society.

I don't intend for this to be a "values" blog, so best to leave it for oneself to determine what's the right thing to do.
 
greengate said:
No. It's about cultivating a spirit of generosity.

As a culture this has been lost for the most part as we have increasingly become a me society as opposed to a we society.

I don't intend for this to be a "values" blog, so best to leave it for oneself to determine what's the right thing to do.

I'm sorry for being dense, but I still don't understand who is supposed to be generous. Is it the credit card company? Or the electric utility? Property owners? Taxpayers? Or is ChargePoint supposed to pay all of these people and just pick up the tab out of the kindness of their hearts? That sounds like a charity to me, and I'm sure there are far more worthy causes for charity than you and I. :)
 
Sledge said:
And who, specifically, do you think should be "giving something back to the community"? Sure you can't mean 350Green, Charge Point, etc, or their contractors - would you ask them to work for free? Or do you mean that IL taxpayers should be "giving back" to a subset of other taxpayers (EV owners)? This seems like a reverse transfer payment to me - would you ask that poor people pay income and sales tax in order to further subsidize your $30K+ electric car?

Well some host businesses already are "giving back to the community", like the handful of Walgreens in the Chi area with AV units rather than Chargepoint units, as well as Interpark garages downtown and at least one Whole Foods, which have decided to program their Chargepoint units to charge without a fee. I believe they've decided they are more likely to recoup the cost of hosting an EVSE by getting more business from people like me. This results in me shopping and/or parking at those locations whether or not I'm in need of a charge, so to me it's a reasonable approach.

Totally agree on the botched rollout of level 2s in the area though. Many current locations don't make sense. There's no reason a level 2 should be somewhere you wouldn't spend less than an hour. Meanwhile there are a lot of missed opportunities: choosing places you might actually spend 2 hours like malls, parks/forest preserves, neighborhood/suburb surface lots, gyms; distributing more intelligently across the area; co-locating with DCQC at tollway oases (for those of us without that option and as a backup for those with). Plus, at least 1/4 of the EVSEs I've found on Plugshare and wanted to use weren't running, weren't accessible or didn't exist.
 
dmen said:
Well some host businesses already are "giving back to the community", like the handful of Walgreens in the Chi area with AV units rather than Chargepoint units, as well as Interpark garages downtown and at least one Whole Foods, which have decided to program their Chargepoint units to charge without a fee. I believe they've decided they are more likely to recoup the cost of hosting an EVSE by getting more business from people like me. This results in me shopping and/or parking at those locations whether or not I'm in need of a charge, so to me it's a reasonable approach.
Maybe it would be useful to build a database (in the wiki section?) with all publicly available free chargers in the Chicagoland area. Opinions?
 
lukati said:
dmen said:
Well some host businesses already are "giving back to the community", like the handful of Walgreens in the Chi area with AV units rather than Chargepoint units, as well as Interpark garages downtown and at least one Whole Foods, which have decided to program their Chargepoint units to charge without a fee. I believe they've decided they are more likely to recoup the cost of hosting an EVSE by getting more business from people like me. This results in me shopping and/or parking at those locations whether or not I'm in need of a charge, so to me it's a reasonable approach.
Maybe it would be useful to build a database (in the wiki section?) with all publicly available free chargers in the Chicagoland area. Opinions?


Nice idea, but what is the wiki section?

I know of one free charger in Northbrook. It is located in front of the Whole Foods Market. There are two level 2's, (only one is working, but you need the Charge Point card. The other is stuck on "load." Iv'e reported it several times to Charge Point, but nothing happens.)

There is a Level 3 charger also. While it appears to be working, you can't access it without a card, so unless you have a card you are out of luck since no new cards seem to be issued at this time.

There's also a free level 2 at the AutoBarn Nissan Leaf dealer located on Chicago Ave. in Evanston. While you can get to it 24/7, they may cut the power out of hours. Might be best to call ahead..847-475-8200
 
greengate said:
Nice idea, but what is the wiki section?
At the top of the page there is link called "Nissan Leaf Wiki". I started a page called Free Public EVSEs and added your two locations. Anyone can edit the wiki and add locations or correct the information that is already there. Could be fun and useful.
 
lukati said:
greengate said:
Nice idea, but what is the wiki section?
At the top of the page there is link called "Nissan Leaf Wiki". I started a page called Free Public EVSEs and added your two locations. Anyone can edit the wiki and add locations or correct the information that is already there. Could be fun and useful.

Got it. Very nice.
 
lukati said:
Maybe it would be useful to build a database (in the wiki section?) with all publicly available free chargers in the Chicagoland area. Opinions?

I added the sites I can remember off hand.
I will say that if you filter out fee-charging sites on Plugshare, the map for this area looks pretty accurate. I'm sure a few Nissan dealerships and other undiscovered (for Plugshare purposes anyway) free EVSEs are missing, but otherwise I'm not sure that a list here would be very useful.
 
Does anyone attend local meets? I would love to see what everyone is doing to their cars in addition to actually seeing another Leaf driver.

Local Leaf spottings = 0

If you're up in the Gurnee area and see a Leaf driving around it's most likely me...
 
CasperNleaf said:
Does anyone attend local meets? I would love to see what everyone is doing to their cars in addition to actually seeing another Leaf driver.

Local Leaf spottings = 0

If you're up in the Gurnee area and see a Leaf driving around it's most likely me...

Welcome to the forum!!

Be sure to add your LEAF's model/color in your signature ... there was an event for all EV's last spring (you may see it mentioned in this thread) but nothing more recent that I can recall, I see many more Tesla's and Volts then LEAF's but travel a bit further south than Gurnee (Deer Park, Schaumburg/Hoffman Estates, Lincolnshire, Buffalo Grove and Palatine for the most part). Most recently saw a '13 LEAF in the distinct new dark grey color in Deer Park area. I'm surprised that most of the new LEAF's that I see don't have the lower cost, low numbered 'EL' (specific to 100% electric vehicles) IL plates but if the dealer or the new owner doesn't mention it most would not know. No mod's on ours but may swap the rims later with those on the Nissan Juke once my OEM tires wear out. Here is one owner on the forum (PatricioEV) who did the switch (same color LEAF as ours):

2012LeafSL.jpg
 
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