EV charger etiquette
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Now, anyone who drives an electric vehicle or EV knows that public charging can be a maddening experience. Broken charge points, often limited numbers of sockets at motorway services and sometimes long queues with more electric vehicles on the road than ever before and predictions that sales will rocket in the coming years. EV charger etiquette is more important than ever before to discuss. Some of this, I'm joined by Head of Communications for Dundeele Cars, Paddy Common, and by James Kavanagh, presenter and podcaster. Good morning, you're both very welcome. Paddy, I might start with you. And the whole thing about EVs, people are, you know, sometimes can be reluctant or whatever. They'll make the jump if they think the price makes sense, the cost makes sense.
Does it make sense at the moment?
It does make sense depending on where you're charging it. So if you're charging at home, an average person is going to spend about 780, say 800 euro per year on charging the car versus about 2000 or 2200 euro for an average petrol or diesel car. So if on that mix of charging mostly at home and, you know, availing of things like night rate and charging, versus petrol or diesel, there's big savings to be made. Where it doesn't start making sense is if you're using fast chargers all the time because they got very expensive, especially recently. Prices have gone up and in most cases now it will cost you more to go the same distance if you're charging on a fast charger in an EV than you pay in petrol or diesel.
But I suppose the argument is they need that money to invest in the infrastructure and the infrastructure is the other side of the equation.
Yeah, it's expensive. I mean, it is expensive to put that infrastructure in. But it is starting to negate some of the benefits for people who are moving to EVs, especially if they do a lot of driving. I mean, we're trying to reduce the CO2 of the country. And if you're driving a lot on motorways, you're going to be spending a lot. And it's ending up for a lot of people costing more than petrol and diesel.
OK, James, what's your experience? Does it make sense financially to drive an EV?
Yeah. So I live in Kilkenny and my partner lives in Cork. I'm from Dublin. So we're always going back and forth between the two. I'm driving EV now, what, five, six years maybe. And when I started now, my range on the car was like 250. 50, 300, which is kind of useless for me. My newest EV is about 500k, which is kind of what I need. I like, you know, I can get to Dublin and back with a bit of juice or cork or whatever. So it's, it's, um, I also have the charging plug outside my house. So I do all my charging. I plug it in at night. So it's, it's kind of perfect for that sense. But the way I used to do it, I'd have to use the fast chargers halfway to cork, then get to cork. And so Sometimes get a bit stuck.
So for me, range, high, high range is exactly what I need.
Yeah. And that 500k range you have on the new car, is that what it's advertised or is that what you really get?
So it's it's I think you'd get about 400k.
How cost-effective is driving an EV compared to petrol or diesel right now?
air conditioning, radio, all that sort of stuff. I remember once getting a bit stuck on the motorway and I had to turn the air conditioning off and it was like this kind of weather and just to ensure I got to the stop. So, you know, I was kind of, it can get a bit hairy sometimes, but I found now with the 450 kind of K, I never get stuck.
How do home charging and night rates change the economics of EV ownership?
Right. And Paddy, that increase in range, the newer models, they're really fantastic in terms of range, aren't they?
Yeah, we've seen a great increase in the capability. Batteries have got bigger. The technology has got cheaper. So previously when they came out, you were lucky to get 200. Now the average one is... is well over 400 kilometres. Some now have come out over the last couple of months that can do 800 kilometres. Oh, wow. Consider Mallin to Misne is just over 600 kilometres.
There's very few places in Ireland it's not doable now at this rate. Absolutely, yeah. Okay. But EVs, obviously, they're no longer a novelty.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–3:04
2
How cost-effective is driving an EV compared to petrol or diesel right now?
3:04–3:26
3
How do home charging and night rates change the economics of EV ownership?
3:26–4:28
4
When does frequent use of fast public chargers make EVs more expensive?
4:28–11:51