One of the benefits of EVs is we can get rid of a lot of infrastructure. Everywhere already has electrical so home and destination chargers are a minor add on and it’s only superchargers that are new infrastructure. Meanwhile the entire gasoline and oil refining, distribution, and tens of thousands of gas stations can just go away, along with their associated pollution.
Swappable batteries may sound cool but they’re less edficient plus now we have to build up a huge new set of infrastructure agai, we have to standardize batteries, and we can’t build them into structural parts. The only real advantage is speed but that’s not much advantage if you need to drive somewhere. I’ve never had to charge more than 25 minutes at a supercharger, so swapping a battery is only convenient if it’s at most ten minutes more away. Then you’re also assuming there will be more more battery and charger advances, such as those solid state batteries that a couple vendors claim are already in production, such as 800v charging that a few vehicles already can do, such as the latest Superchsrgers that can charge faster than any car can accept so far, or the semi chargers that have a few built out.
Long before you could build out a huge new infrastructure for seappable batteries and standardize cars around it, we’ll already have charging improvements that will make seappables irrelevant. You could argue they already are irrelevant in some areas
While 25 mins doesn’t sound terrible you have to consider throughput. Long lines, waiting for chargers could become an issue if adoption takes off, and if I ever drove by a set of chargers that was full up and more people waiting that’d probably put me off from buying one.
The destination chargers at work do get a line but we coordinate over slack so you never have to actually wait.
The trick is to get those home chargers deployed everywhere. This is what actually decided me on the futilebess of swappable batteries. Almost everyone could use a level 1 charger, but even a full level 2 charger is the same as a stove circuit or an air condioner. It’s just not a big deal for most people’s electrical service and level 1 can be anywhere. Look at how difficult it’s been to get these deployed despite them being so much cheaper and simpler than what you’re proposing. How will we possibly spend tens to hundreds of billions and decades to build out swappable battery infrastructure if a few billion in charging circuits to mostly existing service is so difficult?
Who benefits from seappable battery infrastructure? Really it’s mostly the same companies that profit from gasoline infrastructure. I’m convinced many proponents are just these companies wanting to continue business as usual. However with plugins, they don’t need to exist
I agree with you. I charge at home weekly. I expect to have enough solar soon that I’ll charge whenever the car is at home and the sun is up
When doing long (2 days of driving) trips I haven’t had any trouble getting a charge. High speed DC chargers had few queues (I had to wait 5 minutes once) and motels have usually given me parking near a power point. I’m in Australia so over night gives me 8 hrs * 240V * 10A = 19.2kWh which is usually enough to get to the next fast charger
Swappable batteries might be nice but I doubt they’d be profitable (with home charging) with most just using it to swap end of life batteries for better ones
They’d be ok for people living in apartments or otherwise with no charging at home, but better would be charging in carparks at work
You make some good points, but may I say from a single viewpoint.
I can’t physically charge a car at home.
I work from home and travel to customers - most are hours away and I (usually) can’t charge at their office.
Hence, I don’t have an electric car and my next purchase will probably be a self-charging hybrid because I need to recharge / refuel on the journey - hence quickly.
So, in my case, the only way I can go full-electric is with a short charge (/ battery swap) at the places that currently sell fossil fuel, which are becoming battery charging stations (they already have AC mains, so no new infrastructure required).
I can’t physically charge a car at home.
… and I (usually) can’t charge at their office.
Certainly this is key. Your car is sitting unused for hours at these locations, so even a relatively slow charge would be convenient. We definitely have work to do deploying these everywhere.
My point is more that every workplace, almost every home already has sufficient electrical service to charge for most car uses. We have the technology and it’s naturally broken down into many smaller less expensive projects. It’s much easier to build this out than to create an entirely new infrastructure around disposable batteries, redefine all cars and then scale out. And the technology already exists. But we still have to do it
One of the benefits of EVs is we can get rid of a lot of infrastructure. Everywhere already has electrical so home and destination chargers are a minor add on and it’s only superchargers that are new infrastructure. Meanwhile the entire gasoline and oil refining, distribution, and tens of thousands of gas stations can just go away, along with their associated pollution.
Swappable batteries may sound cool but they’re less edficient plus now we have to build up a huge new set of infrastructure agai, we have to standardize batteries, and we can’t build them into structural parts. The only real advantage is speed but that’s not much advantage if you need to drive somewhere. I’ve never had to charge more than 25 minutes at a supercharger, so swapping a battery is only convenient if it’s at most ten minutes more away. Then you’re also assuming there will be more more battery and charger advances, such as those solid state batteries that a couple vendors claim are already in production, such as 800v charging that a few vehicles already can do, such as the latest Superchsrgers that can charge faster than any car can accept so far, or the semi chargers that have a few built out.
Long before you could build out a huge new infrastructure for seappable batteries and standardize cars around it, we’ll already have charging improvements that will make seappables irrelevant. You could argue they already are irrelevant in some areas
While 25 mins doesn’t sound terrible you have to consider throughput. Long lines, waiting for chargers could become an issue if adoption takes off, and if I ever drove by a set of chargers that was full up and more people waiting that’d probably put me off from buying one.
Maybe but so far:
The destination chargers at work do get a line but we coordinate over slack so you never have to actually wait.
The trick is to get those home chargers deployed everywhere. This is what actually decided me on the futilebess of swappable batteries. Almost everyone could use a level 1 charger, but even a full level 2 charger is the same as a stove circuit or an air condioner. It’s just not a big deal for most people’s electrical service and level 1 can be anywhere. Look at how difficult it’s been to get these deployed despite them being so much cheaper and simpler than what you’re proposing. How will we possibly spend tens to hundreds of billions and decades to build out swappable battery infrastructure if a few billion in charging circuits to mostly existing service is so difficult?
Who benefits from seappable battery infrastructure? Really it’s mostly the same companies that profit from gasoline infrastructure. I’m convinced many proponents are just these companies wanting to continue business as usual. However with plugins, they don’t need to exist
I agree with you. I charge at home weekly. I expect to have enough solar soon that I’ll charge whenever the car is at home and the sun is up
When doing long (2 days of driving) trips I haven’t had any trouble getting a charge. High speed DC chargers had few queues (I had to wait 5 minutes once) and motels have usually given me parking near a power point. I’m in Australia so over night gives me 8 hrs * 240V * 10A = 19.2kWh which is usually enough to get to the next fast charger
Swappable batteries might be nice but I doubt they’d be profitable (with home charging) with most just using it to swap end of life batteries for better ones
They’d be ok for people living in apartments or otherwise with no charging at home, but better would be charging in carparks at work
You make some good points, but may I say from a single viewpoint.
I can’t physically charge a car at home.
I work from home and travel to customers - most are hours away and I (usually) can’t charge at their office.
Hence, I don’t have an electric car and my next purchase will probably be a self-charging hybrid because I need to recharge / refuel on the journey - hence quickly.
So, in my case, the only way I can go full-electric is with a short charge (/ battery swap) at the places that currently sell fossil fuel, which are becoming battery charging stations (they already have AC mains, so no new infrastructure required).
Certainly this is key. Your car is sitting unused for hours at these locations, so even a relatively slow charge would be convenient. We definitely have work to do deploying these everywhere.
My point is more that every workplace, almost every home already has sufficient electrical service to charge for most car uses. We have the technology and it’s naturally broken down into many smaller less expensive projects. It’s much easier to build this out than to create an entirely new infrastructure around disposable batteries, redefine all cars and then scale out. And the technology already exists. But we still have to do it