How much standby power does your wall charger draw?

[donald]

I have, today, been investigating the power drawn by my wall charger for the purpose of establishing wall-wheel efficiency.

It transpires that my particular wall charger unit draws 16 W of power while doing nothing, in its standby mode.

So that adds up to 140 kWh per year, while I am anticipating 6,000 miles using 1,400 kWh.

So my wall charger is, itself, going to use 10% of all the energy my EV is going to use?!

Does your wall charger have a standby mode when not plugged in, and if so then how much power is it using?

 

[TomT]

That seems like a lot... My Blink, one of the more power hungry EVSEs, draws about 6 watts in standby after all the updates...

It transpires that my particular wall charger unit draws 16 W of power while doing nothing, in its standby mode.

 

[donald]

I have a 7kW charger. Not sure that should make any difference in standby, though.

 

[Boomer23]

My Aerovironment unit draws about 5 Watts.

 

[mbender]

Good question, I am going to have to check. I use only the 110V EVSE that came with it, but the adapter brick is under lock and key, which would make it a pain to plug and unplug every time I needed to charge if the standby draw is too substantial.

You would think that with all the fancy electronics they have had to master and synchronize, they would have been able to have it fall asleep and draw less than a watt or so, and then "wake up" when plugged into the vehicle. Wouldn't you, or am I missing something?

 

[Berlino]

It transpires that my particular wall charger unit draws 16 W of power while doing nothing, in its standby mode.

When it's in standby, can you cut it off at the circuit-breaker?

 

[dgpcolorado]

I think that Phil said his upgraded Nissan/Panasonic EVSEs draw about one to two watts in standby. It is too small for me to measure with my utility-style meter. (I don't have the 120 Volt adapter for the upgraded EVSE to use with my Kill-a-Watt meter.)

My non-upgraded Nissan/Panasonic EVSE draws 2.9 watts in standby, according to the Kill-a-Watt meter.

 

[bowthom]

My blink draws 8W according to my TED. Lots of room for error in these small currents though.

 

[dgpcolorado]

When it's in standby, can you cut it off at the circuit-breaker?

Circuit breakers aren't designed for flipping on and off many times.

To get rid of the standby draw, I'd suggest installing a regular switch in the line. Sixteen watts seems very high for standby. That's 140 kWh per year!

 

[Randy]

Clipper Creek = zero vampire load

As measured by my Smart Meter (I have a separate meter for the car)

 

[DaveEV]

My Smartmeter indicates that my Blink draws about 10-11W. This comes out to about 96 kWh / year or 8 kWh / month. About 3-4% of my total EV usage. Should be lower!

 

[pchilds]

My Blink used 16 kWh in 3 weeks, that comes to 25 watts in stand by. Blink kept calling, because it wasn't phoning home, so I added a timer and relay, to power up the Blink for 30 minutes a day to phone home.

SPX Power Xpress and Clipper Creek CS-60, together less than 0.1 kWh a day.

 

[Rauv]

My GE Wattstation in OFF mode is 1.2 watts; Standby (ON but not charging) draws 4.2 watts.

 

[swaltner]

Clipper Creek = zero vampire load

As measured by my Smart Meter (I have a separate meter for the car)

Which CC unit do you have? According to a dedicated MTU/CT on my TED 5000 says my ClipperCreek LCS-25 draw 2 Watts at idle.

 

[like2bike]

I have, today, been investigating the power drawn by my wall charger for the purpose of establishing wall-wheel efficiency.

It transpires that my particular wall charger unit draws 16 W of power while doing nothing, in its standby mode.

So that adds up to 140 kWh per year, while I am anticipating 6,000 miles using 1,400 kWh.

So my wall charger is, itself, going to use 10% of all the energy my EV is going to use?!

Does your wall charger have a standby mode when not plugged in, and if so then how much power is it using?

Which EVSE do you have that has a 16 W standby use?

 

[Stanton]

I think that Phil said his upgraded Nissan/Panasonic EVSEs draw about one to two watts in standby.

I concur (measured via my "modlet").

 

[like2bike]

I installed my Schneider EVlink today. Measured standby power with Kill-a-watt meter before the final connection. Negligible power (< 1W) was indicated for the 120V half-circuit that was tested. So, the standby power is between 0 and 2 watts. Very happy with that result and with the EVlink overall!

Also, note that measuring the milliamps draw in standby and calculating volt-amps will probably give a value several times higher than the actual wattage. This results from a poor power factor of the power supply for the electronics. I verified that this was the case for the EVlink. I also used the Kill-a-watt meter to verify the charger in the Leaf has a very good power factor (used the Nissan L1 for this test).