Randy said:
electricfuture said:
I talked to Adrianne a couple of days ago so I knew charging would not be free – however she did not know the rate. I think we should wait and see. Although I suspect a tier 3 rate seeing most will charge during the day.
Did anyone charging today pay anything? How much?
... This rate will definitely discourage going electric – is that their objective? I thought this was to publicly encourage more people to get on board.
The UT article is quoting the rate at the Space Theater / Science Museum to be $2.50 per hour, but not until the end of the year. A Blink RFID card is required even if the price is free. No one today had to pay, and I don't think they'll be set up to charge money for the use of the EVSEs until the end of the year.
I haven't charged at the Lodge in TP, but others have and it was free when it was first set up. Not sure what their price will ultimately be. The prices will be set by the EVSE hosts, depending on their costs and their customer strategy.
... For me, the bottom line is that I'll charge at home most of the time, and will grab a charge at a public location occasionally, when it is convenient and priced right.
Wow. If a host charges and EV to charge but doesn't charge a parking fee for all vehicles, I'm liable to not go to that business anymore. The cost of the parking space is a huge subsidy to all vehicles, that is far greater than the cost of an EV charging station and Electricity for the life of the charging station. It's not a matter of entitlement, EV pride or anything of the sort, it's just simple economics from the consumer's point of view and managing the lifetime operating costs of your vehicle. Maybe when gas hits $20/gallon...
The parking space costs the business about $10,000 to $40,000 each! It's odd how since EVs are new, there's the desire to charge money for everything ignoring the huge subsidies that are already given away to every vehicle. And of course they send junk mail to your home, take out ads in the paper, so EV charging could be low cost marketing. Many businesses don't charge for paper cups, take out containers, utensils etc. but they're getting to charge for a few dozen cents of electricity.... And part of the offset to the higher purchase cost of an EV is reduced operational and energy costs. Wiht most of the Charging station billing plans, they dramatically raise the cost of EV energy close to that of gasoline, at least until the price of gasoline doubles.
For LEAF owners, that are 100 mile range Electrics, the pricing is silly. Imagine how truly insane it is when you show up in your Plug In Prius that only holds 13 miles wirth of Electricity, around 3 kWHif it's completely discharged and your going to pay $2.50 or $5 for what amounts to around $0.30 worth of energy / electricity? That's going to defeat the whole idea of Plug IN charging for Plug In Hybrids, which ironically due to their small batteries will need to Plug In every chance they get to minimize gas use, even in their home city. 100 mile range EVs on the other hand won't need to plug in that often in their home city.
Charger maintenances and costs do present a few economic challenges but nothing greater than many freebies and marketing budgets businesses already spend on their customers.
They really need to think this through beyond the bean counter asset cost recovery point of view, or at least apply some of the same models they do for the parking space that any vehicle - gas, plug in hybrid, or electric uses. For the most part I consider the physical parking space, be it subsidized and free to the consumer or paid parking, to be a significantly greater costs than the EV charger and electricity such that the cost of the EV charger can just be regarded as part of the parking space or marketing budget.
So the proposed charging costs sounds way out of line, high enough that it will encourage increased use of gasoline by Plug In Hybrids.
It's going to be sad if public EV charging is priced so high that it actually becomes a dis-incentive for EVs! (and even more for Plug In Hybrids) 
