Estonia does it faster!

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edatoakrun

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Location
Shasta County, North California
Any Estonians care to comment on how well it's working?

Any Americans care to comment on how our driving experience would differ if we already currently had about the same (population adjusted) access to ~5,000 DC chargers?

Estonia takes the lead in electric car infrastructure



Estonia has become the first country in the world to have a complete national network of DC fast chargers.

The tiny eastern European country contracted ABB to install around 200 DC fast charger across the state, creating in the process, the highest concentration of fast chargers anywhere in Europe.



The chargers are installed in urban areas where the population exceeds 5,000, and on major roads throughout the country. On highways, the chargers are never more than 60km apart, meaning that EV drivers can have free rein to travel anywhere in the country without fear of running out of charge.

The fast chargers are part of a wider network of some 700 charging points across the country. It might sound surprising that such a small country, with a population of around 1.3 million should take the lead in building EV infrastructure, but Estonia has long had a reputation for being an early adopter of technology, as the birthplace of Skype and having enjoyed widespread Wi-fi access for years.


CHAdeMO standard

Because the charging stations are all fast chargers, the time it takes to ‘refuel’ an electric car is cut from the regular time of around eight hours to around 30 minutes. ABB’S Terra 51 DC fast chargers comply with CHAdeMO charging standard and can be used with DC of up to 50kW as well as alternating current (AC) of to 22kW.

ABB won the contract to install the chargers in 2011 and completed the work in just six months...
http://www.thegreencarwebsite.co.uk/blog/index.php/2013/02/20/estonia-takes-the-lead-in-electric-car-infrastructure/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
 
More details at the link below, including details of (IMO) a potentially workable economic model:

...The government's idea was that EV charging should be fuss-free, fast and uncomplicated. The government succeeded. It's also accessible to most EVs thanks to ABB, the manufacturers of all chargers, which installed dual units. Each charger has a 50-kW Chademo port (for Japanese EVs like the Nissan LEAF) and a 22-kW AC plug (for Renault or Smart EVs). Many people talk about those new dual chargers, but they are already deployed nationwide in Estonia.

Payment is uniform across the whole network, with three schemes to choose, depending on the expecting number or charging sessions per month. The volume package is €30 ($40) for up to 150 kWh. That's not exactly cheap, but Estonia has no plan to give energy away. The charging stations network has to be economically sustainable. The service opened this week, and as of today, there are less than 500 EVs in private hands in Estonia. With only 1.3 million people, there will never be millions of EVs in this country, but it's a reasonable hope that EVs will very soon take a substantial share of the new car market...

http://www.plugincars.com/estonia-another-ev-leader-northern-europe-126505.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
 
edatoakrun said:
Any Americans care to comment on how our driving experience would differ if we already currently had about the same (population adjusted) access to ~5,000 DC chargers?

47k miles on the Federal Highway system so that works out to a fast DC charger every 9 miles.. too inconvenient :)
 
More detail in this presentation on Estonia's recently completed DC infrastructure installation.

See the Use/technology grid analysis on p 10.

Very unfortunate, IMO, that the same analysis was never undertaken here, and so the USA has wasted so much time and resources on slow AC, when it is so obviously of very limited use for public charging.

http://www.chademo.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/3.Presentation_Estonia.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
 
Estonia did even more.

ELMO, government organization that promotes electric cars, now offers inexpensive rental of Leafs and i-Mievs. First hour costs only 6EUR, every other goes for 3EUR/extra, until you reach 30EUR total, thats a daily rate. Imagine renting a Leaf for 30EUR/day, no strings attached?

Well as far as the infrustructure of fast charges, so far there are 160 Chardemo charges installed and working.
You can see a map here: http://elmo.ee/laadimispunktide-vorgustik/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Blue ones are chargers, green ones are those that are used right now.

I took a Leaf for a round trip of 460km for a day in the summer.
Rental Leafs are all 2011 models, so you know they won't last long on the highway. But I figured if you are doing 90km/h (common speedlimit on most Estonian roads), you can last for about 90-100km. After that you can pull over to the fast charger, and get a free (rental Leaf gets it free) charge of about 83-86% in approximately 27-33 minutes. So overall it took me longer than using a conventional car, but it was an adventure, no regrets.

Right now its even more interesting, because its getting colder, and I'd like to see the performance of Leafs during common Estonian winter, when it goes down to -20'c or worse. 2013 model has updated heating system, and Nissan rep told me today that battery heating, and new heater would solve all issues of the previous models. Lets wait and see.
 
Now I'm imagining a setup where you pull into a charge station and swap your rental for another one that's charged, significantly reducing the length of that 30 minute stop.

Beware of advice from Nissan dealers. The battery heater will take you up as far as -4C. I don't know how much that will help.
 
-20C gives you 50km of range (old leaf) and fores you to wear mountain skiing clothes because 5kW of heating isn't enough. Fast charging takes about 2 times more time (~40 min) than in summer (~20 min). After adding diesel heater: its warm inside and about 20-25 km more range.

By the way: Estonian II largest city has Electric-Taxi company with 9 old Leafs and constantly growing number of new Leafs (app 5). Within a year they have done over 1 million kilometers.
 
Rootengieneer said:
By the way: Estonian II largest city has Electric-Taxi company with 9 old Leafs and constantly growing number of new Leafs (app 5). Within a year they have done over 1 million kilometers.
How much per car, per year?
 
Rootengieneer said:
-20C gives you 50km of range (old leaf) and fores you to wear mountain skiing clothes because 5kW of heating isn't enough. Fast charging takes about 2 times more time (~40 min) than in summer (~20 min). After adding diesel heater: its warm inside and about 20-25 km more range.

By the way: Estonian II largest city has Electric-Taxi company with 9 old Leafs and constantly growing number of new Leafs (app 5). Within a year they have done over 1 million kilometers.
Andres

please tell us more about the diesel heater you mentioned.
 
Ogi said:
Rootengieneer said:
By the way: Estonian II largest city has Electric-Taxi company with 9 old Leafs and constantly growing number of new Leafs (app 5). Within a year they have done over 1 million kilometers.
How much per car, per year?
I heard about them too. It was said that 2 car drove like 70000 km in a year without loosing any capacity of the battery.
 
My most recent experience with a Leaf:
43000km on it, 91% charged shows 136km (heater on)
Thats Leaf Model1, 2011.
Because its the above mentioned rental, its 99% charged at Chardemo stations.
I'd say not bad. No capacity loss after 1 year of heavy rental use.
 
shima said:
Ogi said:
Rootengieneer said:
By the way: Estonian II largest city has Electric-Taxi company with 9 old Leafs and constantly growing number of new Leafs (app 5). Within a year they have done over 1 million kilometers.
How much per car, per year?
I heard about them too. It was said that 2 car drove like 70000 km in a year without loosing any capacity of the battery.

As I understood from my dealer the taxi company (http://www.elektritakso.ee" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;, google translator should be able to handle this page) is thinking of getting more Leafs as they perform so well.
I am not sure if this is correct but they are using only CHAdeMO charging.
 
If only these Elmo's Chardemos were free to use.. or if the shopping centers started introducing free charging spots. But no one seem to care.

Vana biimer on seni äge auto.. vaatamata sellele et tal on 300k läbisõit.
 
shima said:
If only these Elmo's Chardemos were free to use.. or if the shopping centers started introducing free charging spots. But no one seem to care.

If the Elmo charchers would have reasoned cost - that would be very good already. "Kulupõhine" should be the keyword.
Some new office buildings have at least EV oriented 220V plugs installed - could be used to warm up the car in winter.
I sent such a request to my own office staff. :) And I am thinking of starting to spam shopping centers on this topic. Just like Andy in "Shawshank redemption" - they can not ignore it. ;)

And as I just came from Oslo... Estonia ha a long way to go to catch Norway on EV topic.
 
nemad said:
shima said:
If only these Elmo's Chardemos were free to use.. or if the shopping centers started introducing free charging spots. But no one seem to care.

If the Elmo charchers would have reasoned cost - that would be very good already. "Kulupõhine" should be the keyword.
Some new office buildings have at least EV oriented 220V plugs installed - could be used to warm up the car in winter.
I sent such a request to my own office staff. :) And I am thinking of starting to spam shopping centers on this topic. Just like Andy in "Shawshank redemption" - they can not ignore it. ;)

And as I just came from Oslo... Estonia ha a long way to go to catch Norway on EV topic.

I'm tentatively planning to be in Estonia for the start of this rally:


http://electricmarathon.eu/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

We are glad to announce that this year’s Electric Marathon will take place from June, 03rd to June, 14th!

In 2014 the Electric Marathon is the same like it was last year. Race will start from Saint Petersburg on June, 03rd and finishes on June, 14th in Monte-Carlo and passes Russia, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. In addition to H.S.H. Prince Albert II event is under the patronage of governor of Saint Petersburg Mr Georgy Poltavcehko, Foundation Prince Albert II de Monaco, The President of Russian Charity Foundation “The Future of Homeland“ Mr Kjuri Usmanov and legendary champion from Ukraine Sergey Bubka.

This year’s Electric Marathon 2014 route will start in Saint-Petersburg.
 
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