Recharging times compared to petrol cars have been one of the biggest objections to EVs, but advances in car fast chargers have made this less and less of an issue.

Nio has just announced a 500 kW ultra-fast charger called Power Charger 3.0 on Nio day. It has a maximum charging current of 660A and can charge EVs based on 800V architecture from 10% to 80% in 12 minutes.

These advances, which should become ubiquitous amongst EVs over the next few years, will mean we need fewer superchargers for long-distance travel, and that EVs will become even more practical for those without chargers at their homes.

Honest question

Can the heat/ac be on in the car while it charges?

In most cases yes. I often preheat/precool my car while it’s on the charger at home before even leaving the house.

Thank you

The following submission statement was provided by /u/Surur:

Recharging times compared to petrol cars have been one of the biggest objections to EVs, but advances in car fast chargers have made this less and less of an issue.

Nio has just announced a 500 kW ultra-fast charger called Power Charger 3.0 on Nio day. It has a maximum charging current of 660V and can charge EVs based on 800V architecture from 10% to 80% in 12 minutes.

These advances, which should become ubiquitous amongst EVs over the next few years, will mean we need fewer superchargers for long-distance travel, and that EVs will become even more practical for those without chargers at their homes.

Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/zulppg/new_nio_500_kw_ultrafast_power_charger_30_can/j1jz8ru/

>These advances, which should become ubiquitous amongst EVs over the next few years, will mean we need fewer superchargers for long-distance travel, and that EVs will become even more practical for those without chargers at their homes.

A 12-minute charge would make it close enough to filling up a gas tank that they might add them to existing gas stations. Especially companies that have built up the convenience store aspect, they would try to draw people in to make money on higher profit items like snacks and soda.

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Have you ever heard that your phone battery degrades more the faster you charge it? Did you know these EV vehicles are affected the same way? Every time you use a Supercharger at a grocery store, you are rapidly degrading your battery. L

And no this isn't anti-ev propaganda. This comes directly from my Subaru/Toyota EV training. I was trained to tell my customers to limit the amount of Supercharger uses. So while it's awesome that we can charge a car this fast, please don't think that there isn't a drawback.

It’s a valid point, but if you’re doing this occasionally for long distance road trips the affect is negligible. Most people do / should charge at home for their day to day travel. The higher cost of supercharging vs. at home charging further encourages this behavior.

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Unless your commute is 120 miles each way, you don’t need to supercharge outside of long distance trips

And if you know you're going home you don't even need a full charge

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I wonder if people do not see the 500 kW as an issue or believe it will be magically resolved even though most places have problems even with normal homes and their needs...

Your Subaru / Toyota EV training told you to tell customers to avoid Tesla Superchargers?

The Toyota that famously has avoided EV's as long as they can and don't have ANY right now? Same with Subaru?

Consider your source. Anyone that refers to Generic DC Fast Charging as "superchargers" is not an expert on EV's.

Plenty of people with Teslas have supercharged exclusively and have data. Does it degrade? Yes. Is it "rapidly"? Not at all- some of these cars have 200K miles on them and still have 80%+ capacity.

This was my first question. We are offgrid on solar power for 15 years and now have a good lithium battery. Charge rate is very important and measured in hours not minutes for the very reason you state.

Still not as fast as filling up your gas tank. And it won't even be full.

1. I never mentioned Tesla Superchargers, they are proprietary. Any EV Supercharger that charges faster than what you can get installed at home will degrade your battery much faster.
2. Toyota bZ4X & Subaru Solterra
3. I don't dispute that some brands handle it better. I just know that Toyota, Subaru, Kia, Hyundai, Chevy, and Ford recommend that you stick to slow charging for longevity.

1. "Supercharger" is a Tesla trademarked term. It always means a Tesla charger. The term you are looking for that is used exclusively in the industry is DC Fast Charger (DCFC).

2. Yes, they have one now, in exceedingly limited supply. 10 years after Tesla, who has now shipped 3M vehicles, so maybe they aren't experts on batteries yet??

3. You took Subaru/Toyota training and are sure Kia, Hyundai, Chevy, and Ford all recommend sticking to "slow charging to avoid "rapid degradation"?

Citation needed. What defines "fast charging?" What defines "rapid degradation?"

Are you aware Federal Law requires 8 years/100K mile battery warranties with minimal degradation?

The reason they don't want you to DCFC is they don't want you to realize how minimal the support for DCFC is right now if you don't have a Tesla.

Honestly, if your life is so busy that the 7-10 minutes extra time is a deal breaker, fair play to you.

For the vast majority of cases, people can just charge to full at home, or top up every few days, and these fast chargers work fine for that.

The misleading thing for most people is still thinking in gas terms. You don’t use a fast charger as often as you would a gas station.

I charge at home every night. My car gets almost 300 miles. Most people don’t drive anywhere near that daily. So the only time you need a fast charger is when you go on a road trip.

And using fast DC chargers that infrequently has a negative effect.

Electric cars aren't the answer. And good luck if you charge at home. California is already contemplating charging you more if you charge your car at home and overnight.

Effects Of Frequent Fast Charging An electric car’s ability to accept higher charge currents is affected by the battery chemistry. The accepted wisdom in the industry is that faster charging will increase the rate at which an EV’s battery capacity will decline. However, a study conducted by the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) concluded that while an electric car’s battery will deteriorate faster if it’s only power source is Level 3 charging (which is almost never the case) the difference isn’t particularly pronounced.

The INL tested two pairs of Nissan Leaf EVs from the 2012 model year that were driven and charged twice daily. Two were replenished from 240-volt "Level 2" chargers like those used in one's garage, with the other two taken to Level 3 stations. They were each were driven on public reads in the Phoenix, Ariz. area over the course of a year. They were tested under the same conditions, with their climate control systems set at 72 degrees and the same set of drivers piloting all four cars. The vehicles’ battery capacity was tested at 10,000-mile intervals.

After all four test cars had been driven for 50,000 miles, the Level 2 cars had lost around 23 percent of their original battery capacity, while the Level 3 cars were down by around 27 percent. The 2012 Leaf had an average range of 73 miles, which means these numbers represent a difference of around just three miles on a charge.

It should be noted that much of the INL’s testing over the 12-month period was conducted in extremely hot Phoenix weather, which can inherently take its own toll on battery life, as would the deep charging and discharging necessary to keep the relatively short-range 2012 Leaf running.

The takeaway here is that while DC charging may have an effect on an electric car’s battery life, it should be minimal, especially in that it’s not a primary charging source.

https://www.myev.com/research/interesting-finds/is-dc-fast-charging-bad-for-your-electric-car

>Electric cars aren't the answer

I mean I agree, because I don't think cars are the answer in general. But compared to gas cars? Leaps ahead.

>And good luck if you charge at home. California is already contemplating charging you more if you charge your car at home and overnight.

Good luck with what? With paying an electricity bill?

If people could afford their gas bills, they can afford the electricity bill lol

Using something degrades it. You heard it here first folks. Petrol cars never degrade anything I guess?

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>The Toyota that famously has avoided EV's as long as they can and don't have ANY right now? Same with Subaru?

If you're going to rant about accuracy, at least be correct. Toyota has the BZ4x, and the Lexus ux300e, and the soon to be released RZ450e.

Subaru has the Solterra.

The Bz4x and Solterra are basically the same vehicle. They aren't brilliant, but their existence is not disputable.

A lithium battery is normally good for about 1000 charges at normal rates. I wonder how much of their lifespan gets cut with these superchargers. 750 charges maybe.

I was going to say, 500kW is a lot of power. A charging station with multiple chargers is going to need a god damn substation.

Imagine being without AC for TWELVE minutes.

This is an important piece of the puzzle, but the rest of the grid isn’t ready for this. There needs to be a way to deal with sudden massive loads in order to cope with charging significant numbers of vehicles. Obvious issues with transmission line and transformer capacity, but the bigger issue is dispatching generation to big loads without having a schedule. Most power sources can’t ramp up/down enough other than hydro and small gas turbines.

I don’t think that’s why they really care. Heating and cooling can use a significant amount of energy in certain conditions. If it’s extremely hot or cold they can heat or cool the car while on charge so that the car is near the temp they want when they start driving. Maintaining that temperature will take less energy to achieve plus it will be a more steady, slow draw rather than a big surging draw if the heating/cooling system had to work at max power.

Yeah that's an insane amount of energy. But maybe it could work if they built them at wind and solar farms if you're passing through lol

If it's anything like the Ioniq 5 the AC will slow it down and if it's too hot outside (TX hot) it may not blow cool air. I usually shut the car down and go hang out inside while waiting.

You have to sit somewhere while it’s charging. You can’t sit in summer sun with a baby for even 12 minutes without A/C…

They will have to be strategically placed near high voltage lines.

Most manufacturers are moving to better battery chemistries, the new main stay LiFePo handles it better, and other designs such as solid state batteries are even better.

Neat concept. Tesla stated something like this when they in their first year. Swap out a battery in like 5 min. The cost would be the crazy money to build and maintain them.

Tesla said these years ago, and still never saw one in production.

Now, ULTRA fast charging, 10% to 80% in 12 min. That is awesome but, in the REAL world, there is no chargers like that near you. Only in very modern cities. You will be stuck charging them for like 1-2 hours at a station.

I've been watching a lot of other YouTube channels of people doing traveling in EVs, and it's still pretty bad in a lot of areas. This is not just one area, this is across the country.

We are still in the early ages of EVs over mass market, it will take 15-20 years to be as good and fast as gas cars are. Remember mass market Gas cars came out in the 1908 and it took many years before it was everywhere to get gas.

Charging spots are getting better though.

True enough if you can charge at home. I think the article referenced fast charging as an option for ppl who can’t charge at home. I would like to know how the occasional fast charging effects battery life, I know for our Lithium battery the charging cycles are stringently controlled so as to avoid quick charges. I imagine all these current issues will be resolved as the technology matures. I would like to consider an ev vehicle as our next car but we would have to add a significant amount of solar and if the car is not there during the 10 AM to 2PM sweet spot, then that causes other issues.

>You can’t sit in summer sun with a baby for even 12 minutes without A/C…

We used to do it all the time.

NIO swap station 3.0 can swap the battery in 3 mins, automatically. Also, the auxiliary power keeps the car on during the swap.

I'm interested in how fast charging infrastructure gets implemented. Charging at 500 kw/vehicle means a service station with 16 vehicles could put 8MW swings on the grid. That's somewhat substantive.

Multiply times a few charge stations and that could impose maximum 100MW swings.on a grid. Now, that's worse case scenario, it's pretty unlikely you go from 200 vehicles charging to 0. The most likely number is probably 20MW swings.

I see each station having a few MW-hrs of batteries as distributed storage. That way the batteries are trickle charged continuously and the peak loading is essentially behind the meter / off grid.

Oh, a blind man with a brain can see it. The switching gear and copper cables coming from the power plant will be similar to a manufacturing plant requirements (per charging station).

And then offer better rates off peak... the station might be a power plant of a sorts on its own.

Maybe DC is the way

What's really.interesting - if you think about the California duck.curve - peak pricing is likely overnight and midday prices on a sunny day should be very low as there could be an excess of renewable power.

Having lots of battery storage produces interesting electrical arbitrage opportunities.

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You can pull enormous amounts of powe out of the middle voltage powe nets if they are set up properly.

The issue here is that the current infrastructure was juuust good enough to support what is required and now needs modernization anyway.

A few kW isn't enormous.. lol..

So? What's the problem with that? You aren't going to pull a few MW out of the low voltage net in any case

>You have to sit somewhere

No, no you don't.

>You can’t sit in summer sun with a baby for even 12 minutes without A/C…

What kind of rich asshole are you?

I only just got a car that has A/C 2 years ago. I'm a millionaire. Granted that was mostly by choice that I didn't upgrade my 30 year old car, but I still don't have AC on my house. I used to live in Phoenix, AZ., And now live where it still gets 110°F in the summer. I raised 3 kids with no A/C. It wasn't even inconvenient.

Thats already happening, my local ford dealer has a gas station, two DC chargers, 4 AC chargers and a restaurant

Dude we have several 350kW stations close by. 500 kW isn't that much more effectively

Significantly more complex and has even bigger power requirements.

And batteries are pretty expensive parts that you have to have in storage.

Plus.. it will limit how you can build cars for literally decades.

A few minutes that are easily offset by the fact that i only need to visit a gas station to check tire pressure..

You might not want to hear it but that answer was answered about 5 years ago and since then a LOT of people are focusing on building manufacturing resources.

This is mastabatory. The power requirements can't come from a windmill. Build this next to a nuke plant... Sure.

No, a super charging station can slower charge a bank of capacitors. No substation necessary. The amount of time it takes to pull out and pull in a fresh car & hook up doubles the real world time, while your active charge is about 12 minutes.

It seems to be designed to pump out 60A at up to 800V.

So a 600A service is pretty common at 480V for commercial buildings (you can get more I'm just saying this is a really common service). A capacitor bank and a good control unit should make light work of it.

Keep in mind doing fast charging is super bad for your batteries. Also at a local grocery store that has a super charger (they advertise) using that feature costs a few more bucks I'm assuming to discourage it, possibly to get you to shop there and wait longer.

500kw... Do you know how much electricity that is? Damn thing practically would need its own electrical substation. Imagine having to coordinate with grid operators just to charge ONE car at 500KW.

Whole lotta bullshit in one post. Maybe Could have actually been convincing if it wasn’t for the last sentence.

The 'raising 3 kids without A/C not an inconvenience' wasn't convincing?

So your parents were rich assholes too? I'm sorry they found you inconvenient, with or without A/C.

Now mind you I come from oil money. Oklahoma, no A/C even existed when we got the family minerals rights, old oil money. I've seen my fair share of rich assholes.

If Jeff Foxworthy talked about rich assholes instead of rednecks:

If you're complaining about something you don't have when some other people don't have it either, you might be a rich asshole.

If your "need" is a luxury comfort, you might be a rich asshole.

If your children are inconvenient because your wants aren't met, you might be a rich asshole.

LFP can easily do 3000.

Relax Mr. Plainview. No one needs or asked for your resume

How did humans ever survive 100000 BC - 1950s without car AC??

Looking at some pretty short battery life expectencies as well if this feature is used often...

Not at that charging rate, no matter how modern you chemistry is.

Sure, but say it cuts your charging cycles by 1/2, which reduces the life of your battery say from 1 million miles to 500,000 miles.

The car will fall apart well before then.

660... Amps? It says charging current of 660 volts which makes no sense. 500 kW/800V is 625 amps, so it doubly makes no sense.

Convenience. Places where you can create new mid voltage lines from main station and places where people go in mass will rarely coincide.

500 per single station is not? Sure.

You are right. The real specs are:

• Peak Charging Power of 500 kW

• Maximum charging current of 660A

• EVs with 800V architecture can be charged from 10% to 80% in just 12minutes!

https://twitter.com/AfonsoEV_/status/1606621111055450112

Compared to what big machinery needs? No.

Companies regularly pull MW out of the net .

You compare a whole company to needs of handful of chargers? You do not get how insane this is? As a low-mid voltage certified electrician let me tell you - it is mental.

That's why maximum charge speed is achieved on 800v based systems.

Subaru and Toyota can use superchargers? I thought that was a tesla technology/standard. What voltage traction batteries do subaru and Toyota use?

They didn't have to wait for their cars to charge for one

These things would probably be integrated into a smart grid. Definitely in places which are putting the appropriate priority in managing grids better. EV charging can be an excellent tool for grid stability if the charger is in close communication with the grid.

An example is the UK smart charge point regulations that requires all new EV chargers to be able to negotiate with the grid and defer charging and such.

Energy storage aka Megapacks at the site

Why can’t you? I have a baby and am pretty familiar with the issues surrounding them.

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Yes, it seems like a solution to something that most people will find wasn't really a problem to begin with, since slow charging overnight in the garage will adequately juice-up EVs for most peoples' commutes / groceries, etc.

Won't matter if you sell your fucked battery for scrap to offset the cost of a new one. Lithium going to be very expensive soon.

Lucid uses LFP's with a 900v arch and fast charger, with a 150k mile 10 or 8 year battery warranty including free replacement at 70% capacity. Must not be too worried. Tesla's LFP's routinely last 300k miles with a slightly slower charger than Lucids.

It's good for EVs to do this as well as the AC/heater do significantly reduce battery range.

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It’s already largely a non-issue from a day to day basis for many people. I wake up to a “full tank” every day and spend 0 time thinking about it.

Idk, 15-20 years will see new ICE vehicle sales banned in huge parts of the world.

I think it'll be a lot quicker than that but i understand the USA in general is a long way behind the UK (where i am) on this transition.

They would be aluminum but I get your point.

A few seconds to plug in and then go and do other stuff rather than a few minutes stood by the car filling it up before i can do the other things i need to?

And "full" is a pointless metric, all that matters is how much range you get.

You are seriously saying staying at the station is better than filling up and leaving? And the fuller you get, the father you go so...

IN the car?

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Well this is the car seat from 1950… https://preview.redd.it/kwpgpcwkk3c11.png?auto=webp&s=ff90585808066d9d96a41262acd82dae124b70b2

Just because people survived doesn’t mean it’s the best course of action.

On what charger? because I've hit 170kw with the AC on. Never been to a 350kw charger before though.

150+ kW charger

It's really weather dependent though, if it's just warm outside it's fine, but August with humid weather seems to be too much for it.

The mixer motors at my plant draw 2000+ amps at 480V277V x 3phases. They ramp up and down every few minutes, and we have 5 of them.

This is honestly the best take. People (including myself) gripe and moan about accessibility to charging stations and speed and quality etc. But these stations are truly just a supplement. Out side of long commutes and road trips, I don't ever think about charging. I charge at home with a level 1 trickle charge, and sometimes I'll plug in at the grocery store while I shop just to top off.

I think most.people truly don't need a super duper level 100 charger to top them off in 8 minutes. I need chargers that are reliable and actually work when I pull up to them first and foremost. Beyond that I just want a charger that can get me a good chunk back while a grab milk and eggs at the grocery, or a fast and convenient plug and play while I stop at a gas station to use the bathroom and grab a coffee

How long does the battery last though? Both in per use terms and in life cycles? One of the main things that bug me about how everything nowadays are running on batteries is that batteries are great the 1st few months of use. Then they become crap with no good way to service it except replacing it, and sometimes the whole gadget! ICE engines meanwhile will last decades if maintained well.

I would never test first run products that can kill you l. ESP with lithium. Fuckkkkk that

Right concept, but there's likely better battery chemistry choices because the energy density is less critical on fixed units. It's all about cost and number of charging cycles.

This never happened the most.

I'm saying i stop to charge and do other things at the same time, like going to the toilet, having some food or whatever i want to do. I mean i don't even need to stop and refill specifically since it's all done whilst I'm doing other things, like sleeping at home or watching a film at the cinema.

Meanwhile you are still at the pump. I'm in and out having done what i need and off whilst you are still having a shit after spending that time at the pump.

Except as i said, I'm not stopping to refuel at all, i have no need to. The only time i would is on long road trips where you need to stop for things like toilet and food.

And if you need to go 20 miles it doesn't matter if you can go further. As long as 80% gives you the range you need, why does it matter that it's not "full"?

I mean, you really only need a super charger if you traveling 200+ miles in a day. Otherwise you can recharge at home or maybe at your destination. So if they’re strategically placed every 100ish miles like rest stops you’d probably be fine.

Totally. I feel for apartment dwellers, but that can be solved by ac charging solutions. I personally don’t see a use case for dc chargers being much faster than they are now for road tripping. Stopping every 200 miles for a potty break and snack is longer than people like to admit. Whenever there’s a debate it’s always the “I drive 500 miles nonstop and piss in water bottles and make my kids shit in travel toilets.” 🙄

The real question is, how many times can the battery be charged in this way. Rapid charging like this quickly reduces cell lifespan.

750 charges times 200 miles is 150,000 miles. That sounds reasonable. And you'll probably still have 80% capacity at that point.

It won't actually take more power. Having stacks of batteries means you can charge them at a lower rate thus reducing strain on the grid. The most complex part about it is making sure the tool stays completely aligned.

Uh no. The Lucid Air uses an NMC811 battery pack comprised of Samsung 50G 21700s, and charges at a peak speed of 300kW.

The 900V figure is the max charging voltage.

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The issue is not power. AC takes about 5kW at most, a drop in the bucket compared to propulsion.

It's because AC has to work overtime to cool the battery during charging, so there's no cool air left for the cabin.

You just buy a new car, duh

Fuck the people who live in an apartment I guess.

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I wonder why you can't swap a battery at the gas station just like a propane tank?

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I love this argument because apartments don't have gas pumps and yet somehow the infrastructure functions. Someone should study it!

Right? Let's willfully ignore several dozen maintenance items on ICE cars when we compare.

Infrastructure, you got that right chief. Call me when there's infrastructure.

I mean there are already several 6-8 bank 300kw stations throughout the country.

If you want to exchange faster you need more power, or a LOT more batteries.

Did you stop reading after my first sentence?

A quick googling says an average nuclear plant generates about 1 GW. That's about 2,000 cars to consume the output of an entire power plant. 500kW is an absurd power draw for a car. We're going to need massive upgrades for the electric grid as EVs become more popular.

All the gas stations in Norway are already adding chargers, including under the canopy like fuel pumps.

I mean, the infrastructure certainly isn't completed and I'm not sure where you're located. But the US is planning to build 50k a year alongside grid improvements.

Here is a good summary if you're interested: https://usafacts.org/articles/how-many-electric-vehicle-charging-stations-are-there-in-the-us/

In my city you wouldn't need to own a home charging station at this point. There are several 350kw stations within 10 miles which provide 0-80% in 15-20 minutes. Lower power ones are at most major shopping centers and those take about an hour.

> the US is planning

Exactly, outside of US there is almost fuck all.

Did you understand what it means to exchange more than one car quickly?

The problem is not making batteries exchangeable, not problem is making economical.

Lets play a numbers game. Lets assume you want to exchange 5 car batteries per hour? How fast do you need to charge them and how many do you need minimum?

Now 5 cars isn't even fast, you would want to actually exchange them faster to have a real advantage over fast chargers.

If you want to do more cars per hour but charge them significantly slower you have to store more batteries.. so half the speed, double the numbers.. but that ain't even slow.. slow would be maybe ten times slower so ten times the batteries.

Yep.. read it.. a number of time even before you wrote it.

Fair enough. I'm not tracking it globally.

Yeah comparing installed power to used work.. slow clap.. Watt and Joule are properly rotating in their graves.

You only need to recharge whatever is used and that isn't all that much more than currently provided by the net.

Plus

Those 500kW are also just peak power and will only be required for a few minutes per charging cycle. 500kW flat would charge even an EQS in less than 12 minute from 0 to 100 while in reality you never will see a flat 500kW consumption.

In the end those 2000 500kW chargers will maybe pull half at peak power and that only for a few minutes per day distributes over thousands of square kilometers.

Because no one will need that much one location.

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Car batteries also serve as a possible arbitrage opportunities. You could show the user real time pricing on their dash and maybe they'll stop in.

Very true. I think the big time arbitrage options are for vehicles that don't operate much. School buses Tractors / agricultural vehicles Delivery trucks Rental cars / fleet vehicles.

Just think about using school buses to power the grid. They generally don't operate at peak demand (6p in the summer). They are already distributed geographically and would have large batteries.

Most combines only operate 1x per year.

Suddenly these vehicles have an entire new use case.

This will be very hard on the batteries. The battery cooling system is going to need to be way better than what current EV'S currently have.

Finally, a non AI actual futuristic post. Have an upvote!

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The only issue is using fast chargers only for apartment dwellers isn’t going to be great for their barriers no?

At a 1,000 chargers twice a week that means 10 years of battery life ?

About to hit 200k on my 2005 4-runner. I don’t think we’ll ever have cars like that again

Isn’t the only place you need these in between Road trips. Normal L3 seem good for shopping malls like target where people spend 20-30 minutes in. And the rest they charge at home.

isnt the battery tech being able tp accept charge that fast the hard part ?

Yes about 10 years if you only need to charge it twice a week. I think it depends on where you live, a guy on YouTube lives in the mountains of Idaho and especially in winter his driving range gets cut to less than 100 miles in his Tesla. Some batteries are not as good when it's freezing outside. Also, where he lives the speed limit is 80 mph and the estimated ranges are for cars driving like 55mph. They can be a great short range commuter car in a flat and moderate climate, otherwise I think a hybrid makes a better solution.

90% of the time you will charge at home overnight. At the rate things are going, nobody will be foolish enough to build a new gas station. in 10 years most new cars will be EV. In 20 years you will have a hard time buying a new ICE vehicle and gas stations will begin disappearing.