http://www.drive.com.au/motor-news/how-to-drive-for-free-20150603-ghenpp.html How to drive for free June 5, 2015 - Toby Hagon
[video flash We tap into Sydney's charging network to see if you can drive an electric car for free. image http://images-2.drive.com.au/2015/06/03/6583725/Article%20Lead%20-%20wide996696205ghepisimage.related.articleLeadwide.729x410.ghenpp.png1433297937509.jpg-620x349.jpg The BMW i3 can be charged up for free if you plan ahead. Photo: Lucas Kennedy ] Cars cost money. It's no secret to the owners of 16 million of them in Australia. Yet while it's depreciation that is the single biggest cost of owning a new car – in some cases sucking tens of thousands of dollars from your wealth annually – it's fuel that Australians are most determined to save money on. Whether it's driving from suburb to suburb trying to find the cheapest fuel (potentially saving a couple of cents a litre, which could amount to a whole dollar off your bill in the average family car) or unearthing a trusty shop-a-docket from the depths of your purse or wallet, the prospect of handing Mr Shell or Mr Caltex a little bit less is almost like a national sport. Which prompted us at Drive to set a challenge – driving for free. Of course such a task would require some different thinking if we wanted to stave off getting arrested. We're talking about an electric car, or EV (electric vehicle). Having lived with a BMW i3 for three months we can attest to its ability to reduce fuel bills. Our companion was the Rex version, or range extender, which includes a two-cylinder motorbike engine that recharges the batteries if you want to travel beyond the 120-odd kilometre range running purely on electricity. However, what you save in fuel you partially lose in electricity. Our bills have jumped substantially for the i3's time in our garage. A lot less than we would have spent on fuel (think half or less) but enough to make you more studiously check the bill. Treasure map Finding electric charging points is not nearly as easy as finding a place to refuel your car. For starters, there are less of them. There's also no neon lights, no giant branded building and no forecourt with power outlets awaiting your custom. Plus, you can't pick up some overpriced soft drinks and chocolates to quell the munchies. So my first search was using that giver of everything - Google. It revealed the occasional chat room and some apps that could direct you to outlets. Infrastructure company Chargepoint is one that showed up regularly. It has an easy-to-navigate app with details on exactly where the charger is and real time info on whether there is a plug available. ChargePoint national manager Lance Douglass says the network is constantly growing. The business model is about providing the hardware and back-up to encourage everyone from businesses to EV owners to install a charging station. "We sell the station hardware to the owner," says Douglass. "They own it. We offer installation or any electrician can install it. We provide software stations. All ours are fully networked … with a call centre." Douglass says some retail outlets are using it to increase dwell time in-store, with the aim of getting customers to spend more. But the app only shows the Chargepoint stations and you have to be a member to use them (there are about 1300 members, including yours truly), which is an easy – and free - process that results in some coded tags being mailed to you to allow you to access the points. The cloud-based app also provides a history of where you've charged and when. Another app that works well is PlugShare, a crowd-sourced site that relies on EV advocates and those with charging locations making them public. As well as the Chargepoint stations (the biggest single network, with 243 outlets at last count) it also shows carpark stations from councils and hotels, which could be as simple as a powerpoint and dedicated car space. But one of the most interesting features is the ability to search for home chargers. This is people who have identified their house as having an easily accessible charging point that they're happy to lend or rent out to fellow electric car drivers. One I see on our planned route is "Nige", who lives in a beachside suburb and claims to welcome all EV owners. So I call him and tee up a time for our free charge. The morning coffee That man is Nigel Morris, who points to the hundreds of millions of powerpoints in Australia as a potential source of a quick top-up. "Every coffee shop in Australia is a charge point, every caravan park … and every industrial facility in the country," says Morris, who has already begun convincing some businesses to allow EV charging. "We'll get a sign out the front that says EV friendly charge point," he says, also promising to publicise the points on social media. But even with the early wins, finding a friendly powerpoint in Australia is a challenge. Or, at least, finding one in a place you're likely to want a coffee can be challenging. But Stockland shopping centres is putting its green foot forward, with four ChargePoint outlets at its shopping centres in NSW and Victoria. The company is planning to more than double that in the next financial year. According to Stockland's national manager of sustainability for commercial properties, Greg Johnson, it's all about understanding more about EV drivers with the view to encouraging them to shop at their centres. "We know that EVs are on the road in very small numbers, we know that there's likely to be more into the future," says Johnson. "We know at some point our customer base is going to come to us with an expectation that they can park their EVs and charge them in our buildings." Johnson says the stations have attracted 140 charging sessions in five months, and the company is collecting data on usage and popularity. "We wanted to understand what the habits of EV drivers are, what their social networks are," he says. "We're starting to see evidence of where people are making decisions to go to our shopping centres just because they've got charging facilities there." Johnson says the cost of electricity is negligible – less than $1 a visit on average. "It probably costs us more to turn the lights on in the carpark than it would to have an EV charge there. At the moment our view is EV drivers are coming to our centres. They have an expectation they can charge their cars there. It's an amenity that Stockland can provide, just like we provide parents' rooms." So it's the Cammeray centre in North Sydney I head for, picking up a coffee and morning bite while the car juices up. In 45 minutes it adds about 15 per cent more charge, enough for about 20 kilometres. Not bad for an early start. Dropping in Car dealers are an obvious choice for EV charging. Many have ChargePoint outlets. One is a Nissan dealer, but it turns out it's a private station (about half the ChargePoint ones are; the company also fits home charging stations, for example). We're shooed away before even getting the charging plug off the wall because we're not driving a Leaf (Nissan's electric car) and it's not a public charging point. To test the sentiment I call another Nissan dealer who is listed as having a charging point and he's more than welcoming of our i3. "Yeah sure, if no one is using it you're free to charge up". Before then, I'm keen to test a charging point provided by Willoughby Council. It's buried in a carpark with a 15-amp powerpoint (so it can slow charge all electric cars except the Tesla) on the back wall. There are two spots, but one of them is taken by a beaten-up ute I'm guessing hasn't been converted to electricity. And therein lies one of the challenges for EV owners. Unlike disabled spots and parents-with-prams spots there's far less community negativity to stopping the rare occurrence of an electric car filling that space. Getting ICEd – where drivers of Internal Combustion Engines block an EV driver - is something Stockland's Johnson acknowledges is a problem. "We are very conscious of EV drivers getting 'ICEd' and being inconvenienced by non-EV drivers parking in the charge spots so we need to plan where we position them," says Johnson. "EV drivers tell us they are happy to park away from the main entry areas knowing they can charge for free and if it means they are not getting ICE'd." Still, I duck in on the second plug for a quick charge, albeit one that does little to extend the car's range. A quick bout of window shopping adds a paltry six kilometres to the car's predicted range. It's barely enough to justify the extra couple of laps of the block to find the outlet. But, hey, if my shopping list was longer it could at least get me home. Next stop is the main BMW dealer in Sydney. The dealer is more than happy to shuffle a car or two so my i3 can easily fit into one of the two charging bays. And owners of any electric cars are welcome; "it gives us a chance to show them what we've got to offer," the dealer tells me. It gives me time for a quick look around the dealership, where the i3 and its bigger, significantly faster (and a lot less dorky) i8 sibling sits proudly in the showroom, charging cords plugged into something a lot sexier than most of the charging stations I've seen so far. Driving out of the dealership, one thing I'm noticing is that many of the charging stations are not in tourist areas - beaches, many popular CBD haunts, and so on. They tend to be in hotels or shopping centre carparks, the first of which you're unlikely to take your electric car to (most of them won't make it far enough from home to justify the night away) and the latter will probably will be somewhere you'll be keen to get out of once you've stocked up. But Morris, who I'd called earlier, is happy to help. I roll up to his house and there's nothing to give away it's welcoming of EVs like mine. Just a regular front yard, a regular driveway and regular dogs that would prefer to lick and sniff rather than admire my ride. Morris' charging point is a simple power cord in the garage. But it's fed by the solar system on the roof, something that ensures he pays almost nothing for electricity. "I've got solar on the roof here and my solar system generates more than I need here on typical use." As a man selling electric motorbikes he is keen to make life easier for existing and potential customers. "I've got two electric vehicles myself; with the lack of charging infrastructure around Australia it dawned on me that for a lot of people they can use a standard [power] outlet so I thought why not make it available," he says. "It's all about access to a bit of power when you need it, extend your range, make life comfortable." Our charge is brief, but after a chat and potter around Morris' garage we've added another 10 kays or so to the i3's batteries. The verdict So is it possible to live free on electricity? Mostly. With some forward planning – and some limits on where and how far you drive. It also helps to have solar on your house, taking advantage of the free, renewable energy from the sun. Still, there are enough free charge points for those who can be bothered to plan their day that meticulously. And more charging stations are being added regularly, either by PR-hungry government departments or businesses who see value in it. But those fitting the popular ChargePoint ones can choose to charge people at any time. "Our station management software comes with flex billing," says ChargePoint's Douglass. "At some point, some may choose to commercialise their station and others may not." Not that Stockland is planning that in the foreseeable future. "We just see it as a point of difference and an amenity," says Johnson. Still, the EV route is a slow burn, and one that won't properly start to smoulder for years at best – likely more than a decade. But the greater the acceptance, the easier it should be to top up for nix. BMW i3 Rex pricing and specifications Price: $69,900 Power: 125kW Torque: 250Nm Transmission: Single-speed 0-100km/h (claimed): 7.9 seconds Claimed electric-only range: 170km Realistic electric range: 100-120km Short cuts Electric vehicle charging stations are rare in Australia and there's no government incentives to have them set up. It hasn't stopped Tesla, which is developing its own "supercharger network", which aims to allow Tesla owners to fast-charge for free, something designed to make the premium-priced cars more appealing. The network is planned for the eastern states and, when complete, promises to allow charging between Brisbane and Melbourne. But don't get excited about tapping into this free-ness; Teslas use a unique charging plug, so the stations won't work with other EVs. Once your car is charging you have to hope some Gen Y-er doesn't decide to amuse themselves by unplugging it. Fortunately, the chunkier J-Series plugs (for faster charging) make that much more difficult, locking into the car's access point (it's behind a flap that looks like a fuel filler). But the regular power outlets on the wall could leave you with a plug that's unplugged. The i3 can alert you via an app if it stops charging, but there's the inconvenience of having to go down and plug it back in. [© 2015 Fairfax Media] http://www.businessspectator.com.au/article/2015/6/5/smart-energy/australias-crowded-inner-cities-need-ev-charging-plan Australia's crowded inner cities need an EV charging plan Matthew Wright June 5, 2015 For EVLN posts use: http://evdl.org/evln/ {brucedp.150m.com} -- View this message in context: http://electric-vehicle-discussion-list.413529.n4.nabble.com/EVLN-How-to-drive-an-EV-4free-in-Oz-tp4676199.html Sent from the Electric Vehicle Discussion List mailing list archive at Nabble.com. _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org For EV drag racing discussion, please use NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
