Public charging station protocol

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EVDRIVER said:
Great- every plug in Prius should be allowed as well next. I think the push should be for pure EVs first. Can't wait for the plug in Suburban taking the space as well.
It saddens me to see so much venom against the Volt here. My definition of an EV is a vehicle that has an all-electric range, i.e. is plugged in to charge the battery, and runs only on battery power for some number of miles. A volt meets that definition; it never uses the gas engine until after the battery is discharged.

It happens that most days I drive less than 35 miles. The Volt and Leaf would both be pure electric cars on those days. I occasionally drive 150 to 350 miles in a day. The Volt would not be an electric car most of the time on those days, and the Leaf would probably be sitting at home while I drove a gas guzzler, since I doubt if I could count on quick charge stations.

I've been keeping track of my daily mileage for eight months now and, using what I think are reasonable assumptions, there is virtually no difference between the two cars in the total amount of gas that I would have used. Others will have very different usage patterns from mine, but for me, the Volt would be ever bit as much an EV as the Leaf would be.

I do, however, think that public charging station protocols should be need-based, and in general a Leaf will need the charge more than a Volt will. Just remember that the fellow driving the Volt may be just as much of an eco-freak or Arab-hater or Peak-oil-alarmist as you are, or even more. If the charging station is available, the Volt should be able to use it.

(Some rather rough non-PC terminology there, but I think most of us, including myself, tend toward at least one of those categories, so it's intended as nonprejudicial incorrectness that pokes a bit of fun at ourselves.)

Oh, the farmer and the cowman should be friends.
 
P.S. I assumed that everyone would recognize my final quote, but I suppose I should give proper credit - It comes from Rogers & Hammerstein's well-known musical, "Oklahoma". The final lines of the song and dance are:
Territory folks should stick together,
Territory folks should all be pals.
Cowboys dance with farmer's daughters,
Farmers dance with the ranchers' gals!
We're in new territory here, folks. Let's see if we can't put some civil rules together for it.
 
planet4ever said:
It saddens me to see so much venom against the Volt here. My definition of an EV is a vehicle that has an all-electric range, i.e. is plugged in to charge the battery, and runs only on battery power for some number of miles. A volt meets that definition; it never uses the gas engine until after the battery is discharged.
As much as GM kept disappointing me ... with almost every press release after the initial ones about (again) producing an electric car ( the Volt, not the EV1 :roll: ) ... one after another ... it just seemed to get "worse" ... until I finally got disgusted enough ... and was overjoyed when the LEAF was announced ...

I must still say +1 to what planet4ever has said.

Yes, I might be more of an "idealist", and the fact that it still has all that ICE stuff inside of it, yuk!, makes the Volt "inappropriate" for me. But I don't hate the Volt, and I must say, I had (for a little while) considered a Prius, simply because of the significant reduction of gasoline use, and IFF the Volt was the only game in town, I *would* consider it :shock: and I would absolutely try my darndest to use electric miles whenever possible (opportunity charging). A (irritating) compromise, ok, but being the only game in town ...

Oh wait ! LEAF to the RESCUE ! Yeah! :p

And +1 to needing to develop some sharing protocol we can all live with.
 
planet4ever said:
EVDRIVER said:
Great- every plug in Prius should be allowed as well next. I think the push should be for pure EVs first. Can't wait for the plug in Suburban taking the space as well.
It saddens me to see so much venom against the Volt here. My definition of an EV is a vehicle that has an all-electric range, i.e. is plugged in to charge the battery, and runs only on battery power for some number of miles. A volt meets that definition; it never uses the gas engine until after the battery is discharged.

It happens that most days I drive less than 35 miles. The Volt and Leaf would both be pure electric cars on those days. I occasionally drive 150 to 350 miles in a day. The Volt would not be an electric car most of the time on those days, and the Leaf would probably be sitting at home while I drove a gas guzzler, since I doubt if I could count on quick charge stations.

I've been keeping track of my daily mileage for eight months now and, using what I think are reasonable assumptions, there is virtually no difference between the two cars in the total amount of gas that I would have used. Others will have very different usage patterns from mine, but for me, the Volt would be ever bit as much an EV as the Leaf would be.
Same here - for me, the Volt / Leaf will results in nearly the exact same fuel use. It's rare that I need more than 40 miles range, and then I either need to exceed it by some amount (10-30 miles) where a top-off would be great to avoid using gas on the way back. The other times I'm driving 100-500 miles (and the 100 mile one-way trips usually involve AC & traffic) so the Leaf would be cutting it very close so would likely opt to use the gas car in those situations. Ideally, I'd have a Leaf and a Volt.
 
Does leaving a PHEV "Prius" (10-mile e-range in flat, slow driving), OR any other EV for that matter ... parked in the EV only space, plugged in, done charging, and blocking access to the charging point for a 6-hour shopping trip, or an all-day train ride, or a full work day ... make sense to you?

Sharing is going to require sufficient e-hose reachable parking to be ABLE to share. Generally, only one parking space per e-hose will make "sharing" almost impossible.
 
Level 2 "public" charging:

Initially, there will be relatively few "easy-public-access" charging stations, and most of those will be Level 2. Since it takes a comparatively long time charging with L2 to get a substantial benefit, the people using them will only rarely be actually there to "disconnect" their car when it has charged "enough". However, with a charge timer built into the car (or the charge point), one can expect to encounter connected vehicles that are "done" charging.

It is not clear that the LEAF available-charge location map will distinguish between "charging" (occupied), and "connected but done" (available but blocked), and "disconnected" (apparently available, but with the "blocked" status unknown).

In any case, if one is really needing a charge to reach a destination, that is much different than just a free-fuel "opportunity" charge, even when the extra range is not needed.

I suspect that the "free fuel" users will eventually be discouraged at "public" charge stations (not "provided" by a business to attract customers) through "use" fees that are substantially higher than the cost of home charging, and also much higher than the cost of the "displaced" gasoline in a PHEV.

Stations for "employees only" will likely require a key or card to operate them. Even "attracting" customers to a business might be done with a "good customer" or business-specific charge card that would get the "repeat-customer" attractive (or free) use rates.

It is possible that the EVProject needs a "user-comment" hot-line to get reports on blocked chargers. They may discover that:

1. they really need to include a loop sensor in the "EV" parking space (or spaces, if two spaces can be serviced by one "connect" point).

2. that more parking spaces are needed to "share" - to disconnect a "done" car and begin charging a second EV.
 
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