{"id":22993,"date":"2018-10-25T21:05:57","date_gmt":"2018-10-26T01:05:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/henrypayne.com\/?p=22993"},"modified":"2018-10-25T21:05:57","modified_gmt":"2018-10-26T01:05:57","slug":"detroit-areas-ev-charging-stations-test-planning-and-patience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/2018\/10\/detroit-areas-ev-charging-stations-test-planning-and-patience","title":{"rendered":"Detroit area’s EV charging stations test planning and patience"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Jag<\/p>\n

Bloomfield Hills<\/em>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0The electric-car future is here \u2014\u00a0if you have time to spare, a second gas-powered car and good math skills.<\/p>\n

The Jaguar I-Pace is the first direct challenger to the Tesla Model S and X, and the first in a wave of luxury EVs. Yet, for all their high-priced, technical prowess, vehicles like the Jag are entering a charging-station infrastructure in Michigan that is ill-equipped to keep them running.<\/p>\n

I spent an anxious weekend in the I-Pace testing the limits of Metro Detroit\u2019s charging stations \u2014\u00a0and the patience of my family. Jaguar and other EV-makers strongly advise wiring your house for a 240-volt fast-charger. Without it, plan on scheduling your life around your car.<\/p>\n

With a Tesla Model 3 on order, my house is already wired with a 240-volt Tesla charger. But Tesla\u00a0chargers are incompatible with other brands.\u00a0Previous I-Pace, Chevy Bolt EV\u00a0and Nissan Leaf EV tests have all involved a degree of range anxiety, but my packed Friday and Saturday would be a true test.<\/p>\n

My I-Pace was delivered with a half-charge. Refilling a gasoline-powered vehicle\u00a0to a\u00a0400-mile range is as simple\u00a0as going to the nearest gas station for five minutes. EVs take more planning. The I-Pace display estimated 95 miles of range remained.<\/div>\n

With a busy day of appointments,\u00a0I had no time for my home\u2019s standard 110-volt socket. EV-makers recommend it only as a last resort. A 110-volt charger\u00a0returns a pathetic 4 miles per hour of charging\u00a0at best (it took 19 hours to get back 30 miles of range on a Cadillac CT6 plug-in\u00a0last summer).<\/p>\n

So I plotted a strategy to charge on-the-go.<\/p>\n

Metro Detroit charging options<\/a>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0like most states outside ultra-green\u00a0California\u00a0\u2014 are spotty.\u00a0According to PlugShare<\/a>, a smartphone app for\u00a0locating charging stations, there are about 42,000 locations nationwide, one-third\u00a0of them in the Golden State. They range from charging networks run by companies like EVGo, to obscure, individual outlets in parking garages.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Compare that to about 115,000 gas stations around the country\u00a0\u2014 4,500 in Michigan\u00a0\u2014\u00a0with multiple pumps.<\/div>\n

Crucially, only 15 percent of EV stations are so-called fast-chargers \u2014\u00a0and about half of those are Tesla-exclusive. Fast-chargers can, in my experience, potentially deliver four times the juice of a common\u00a0240-volt\u00a0Level 2 home-charger: A fast-charger can deliver about\u00a080 miles of range in an hour.<\/p>\n

In all of Metro Detroit, I counted 12 fast-chargers in locations as varied as parking lots and auto dealerships.<\/p>\n

With an afternoon appointment at a radio station in Southfield \u201415 miles away \u2014 the Jaguar’s navigation system told me the\u00a0closest charger was a 240-volt unit at a BMW dealership on Telegraph Road. I would have called the dealership to ask permission to charge a Jaguar, a potentially awkward conversation. But it moved to Pontiac months ago.<\/p>\n

No matter. After taking care of radio business, I set course for Nissan\u2019s Technical Center in Farmington Hills\u00a0\u2014 15 miles west \u2014 assuming they would have a bank of chargers for employees who drive Leaf EVs.<\/p>\n

This is how many experienced EV owners charge \u2014\u00a0on fixed daily routes. Plug in at work. Plug in at home. I figured I could have the I-Pace charge while I conducted a Nissan interview.<\/p>\n

Trouble is, all 14 Nissan chargers \u2014 including two fast-chargers \u2014\u00a0were occupied. My Jaguar sat. Range left: 65 miles.<\/p>\n

Rapid-fire afternoon appointments followed. Back to the radio station: 15 miles. Back home: 15 miles. Range left: 35 miles.\u00a0And I had a 7 p.m. movie date with my wife.<\/p>\n

Lacking trust in the nav system for station status, I relied on the PlugShare\u00a0phone app. Sadly, the Maple Theater (and surrounding shopping center) offer\u00a0no charging ports. The closest 240-volt charger: West Bloomfield Library, seven miles away.<\/p>\n

My wife\u00a0and I hatched a plan. She would follow me to West Bloomfield at 6 p.m. in her gas-powered Subaru Impreza, and I would plug in the Jaguar for four\u00a0hours (good for 20 miles per charging-hour \u2014 or 80 total) while we were at the theater and had dinner.<\/p>\n

But the West Bloomfield charger didn\u2019t work. I called station-operator ChargePoint, which tried a system reboot. No luck. Range left: 27 miles.<\/p>\n

We left the Jaguar\u00a0and arrived in the Subaru\u00a0just in time for the 7 p.m. show. Afterward, we fetched the Jaguar, returning home with just 20 miles of charge.<\/p>\n

Saturday dawned and I canceled my usual\u00a0sports-club workout to preserve charge for my noon-2 p.m.\u00a0radio show. Still, I wouldn’t\u00a0have enough charge to get back from the station. I stopped at the Nissan Tech Center on the way\u00a0and bellied up to the fast-charger only to realize\u00a0it was a ChadMo station, a technology that supports the Nissan Leaf<\/a>, not a Jaguar.<\/p>\n

Plan B was right across the parking lot, where I plugged into a less-powerful\u00a0240-volt charger for nearly three hours while getting work done on my laptop. With 53 miles of range, I made it to the radio station, then back home with just 20 miles of range left. Back at Square One despite a morning of charging.<\/p>\n

Next appointment: Meet friends for dinner and a play in Detroit.<\/p>\n

We plotted the evening around the car. The only fast-charger in south Oakland County is at Woodward and Nine Mile in Ferndale, in a Dunkin\u2019 Donuts lot. It was on the Fisher Theatre glide-path and three\u00a0blocks from Pop\u2019s for Italian, a family favorite.<\/p>\n

But when we got in the car at 5 p.m. to head for dinner and the theater, the range had bled to 16 miles from 20. We had suffered the dreaded \u201cvampire\u201d energy loss when a cars\u00a0sits. And Dunkin\u2019 Donuts was 13 miles away.<\/p>\n

My long-suffering wife followed the Jaguar\u00a0to make sure I made it. To maximize range, I turned off the air-conditioning, selected Eco mode and crawled down Woodward using as little throttle as possible. A\u00a0$90,000 Jaguar EV had been reduced to a mere appliance\u00a0accompanied by a gas-powered tugboat. I\u00a0made it to the Dunkin’ Donuts and plugged in.<\/p>\n

When we emerged from dinner, I found the charger had cut off after a half-hour. But I had 60 miles of range \u2014 enough to get\u00a0to the Fisher and back home.<\/p>\n

When my Model 3 arrives later this October, the 240-volt charger in my garage will ease most of my range anxieties. Until I plan a long trip up north to EV-infrastructure challenged Lake Michigan.<\/p>\n

My wife might kill me first.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bloomfield Hills\u00a0\u2014\u00a0The electric-car future is here \u2014\u00a0if you have time to spare, a second gas-powered car and good math skills. The Jaguar I-Pace is the first direct challenger to the Tesla Model S and X, and the first in a wave of luxury EVs. Yet, for all their high-priced, technical prowess, vehicles like the Jag […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22993"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22993\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}