What's the future of charging look like?

[PBRAZ]

Charging is problematic on road trips for a variety of reasons (broken equipment, long lines, derating, etc) . What does the future of charging look like?

-Super fast top ups (5 minutes max) due to higher voltage vehicle systems

-Battery pack replacement, meaning drive over a stall and a robot replaces your battery pack within a few minutes

-Roads and parking stalls will have wireless charging so no stops needed

-Ranges will be 1000 miles+ so less frequent charging required

?



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[COdogman]

I would say it’s probably a combination of all those things. Just like the evolution of ICE travel, EVs will increase their range through better batteries and hopefully more efficient vehicles, and chargers will become faster and easier to find.

Nearly all the truck stop chains have announced plans to add EV charging, which doesn’t get enough attention, IMO. So have many fast food chains. Before we know it, road trips will be easier in the most traveled areas of the country.

I love the idea of wireless charging but I think that is a pipe dream. The roads here in CO develop deep potholes every year because of the weather. If they can’t prevent that how can they add electricity for EV charging to that mix?

 

[Sgt Beavis]

The future looks a lot like this….

 

[zefram47]

Battery swap is almost certainly not going to be part of the equation. Assuming it takes 5 min to perform, a line of 3-4 cars means it's faster to just DC charge. What I'm hoping for is ubiquitous Level 2 AC charging availability. Opportunity charging while your car is normally idle anyway will be the name of the game and required for folks without access to home charging. DC infrastructure is far more expensive than AC infrastructure. Imagine being able to plug in every time you go to a store, restaurant, movie theater, your office, hotel, etc. In that world DC charging really would be relegated to road tripping and you wouldn't have nearly as many folks clogging chargers to 100% that remain local. That said, the DC chargers that do get installed *really* need to have services nearby...meaning food, restrooms, and some level of security not guaranteed in the corner of a dark parking lot at night that we often have now.

 

[PBRAZ]

Battery swap is almost certainly not going to be part of the equation. Assuming it takes 5 min to perform, a line of 3-4 cars means it's faster to just DC charge. What I'm hoping for is ubiquitous Level 2 AC charging availability. Opportunity charging while your car is normally idle anyway will be the name of the game and required for folks without access to home charging. DC infrastructure is far more expensive than AC infrastructure. Imagine being able to plug in every time you go to a store, restaurant, movie theater, your office, hotel, etc. In that world DC charging really would be relegated to road tripping and you wouldn't have nearly as many folks clogging chargers to 100% that remain local. That said, the DC chargers that do get installed *really* need to have services nearby...meaning food, restrooms, and some level of security not guaranteed in the corner of a dark parking lot at night that we often have now.

Agreed, but plug in or wirelessly charge? I think, and hope, the latter is available. All wires in technology eventually become wireless.

 

[zefram47]

Agreed, but plug in or wirelessly charge? I think, and hope, the latter is available. All wires in technology eventually become wireless.

Wireless charging, while convenient, is very lossy. Look at wireless charging with phones and how warm they get when doing so...that generated heat is effectively the loss. The larger the distance and the higher the power, the more loss, IIRC.

 

[emoore]

Agreed, but plug in or wirelessly charge? I think, and hope, the latter is available. All wires in technology eventually become wireless.

I wonder what's the percentage of phones that get wirelessly charged? I think it's pretty low and I think it's cost prohibited to do it on cars unless it's like L2 chargers. But the losses are going to be huge so unless we have nearly unlimited power generation (fusion) I just don't see it happening in the next 20-30 years.

 

[PBRAZ]

Apparently just as efficient as cables. Definitely L2, but if they are ubiquitous then possibly fast enough for multiple, short topups.

 

[BigSkies]

I think there will be a surge in interest in higher range models (400 miles+) but this interest will quickly taper off once customers better understand the cost/benefit trade offs in these massive batteries. Cars with this range will primarily succeed in the luxury segment and for segments that are designed for towing.

Charging will get faster with higher voltages, and eventually with solid state batteries. But this will hit its limits in practice. Charging at faster and faster rates increases costs in a more than linear fashion (more expensive wires, transformers, demand fees, chargers, etc). Solid state batteries promise to enable incredible theoretical charge rates, but I’m skeptical we’ll overcome some of the practical infrastructure limitations to hit those theoretical limits.

But this still leaves a pretty fast charging experience. With solid state theoretically letting a car use the full output up of a charger on a linear basis. You’d be able to add 50kWh on a 350kW charger in ~8 minutes and ~12 minutes at a 250kW charger. I think that’s plenty fast for most people.

The cost of chargers and charging infrastructure will come down with scale too. We’ll start seeing chargers in more locations. In particular we’ll start seeing businesses offer charging as a way to get people to come to their business. There’s lots of opportunities here as the population of EV drivers grow.

 

[Electrified Outdoors]

I think a combo. I think battery swap tech has its place. As EV become more mainstream some folks may want a subscription model for the battery (like buying the car but leasing the battery). Battery swap stations could easily swap out batteries in the even there is an issue vs long downtime having the vehicle in service and the potential if a large cost all at once for module or battery replacement.

 

[jjswan33]

The future looks a lot like this….

I think you meant this...

 

[PBRAZ]

I think there will be a surge in interest in higher range models (400 miles+) but this interest will quickly taper off once customers better understand the cost/benefit trade offs in these massive batteries. Cars with this range will primarily succeed in the luxury segment and for segments that are designed for towing.

Charging will get faster with higher voltages, and eventually with solid state batteries. But this will hit its limits in practice. Charging at faster and faster rates increases costs in a more than linear fashion (more expensive wires, transformers, demand fees, chargers, etc). Solid state batteries promise to enable incredible theoretical charge rates, but I’m skeptical we’ll overcome some of the practical infrastructure limitations to hit those theoretical limits.

But this still leaves a pretty fast charging experience. With solid state theoretically letting a car use the full output up of a charger on a linear basis. You’d be able to add 50kWh on a 350kW charger in ~8 minutes and ~12 minutes at a 250kW charger. I think that’s plenty fast for most people.

The cost of chargers and charging infrastructure will come down with scale too. We’ll start seeing chargers in more locations. In particular we’ll start seeing businesses offer charging as a way to get people to come to their business. There’s lots of opportunities here as the population of EV drivers grow.

Interesting about solid state batteries. I was skeptical of all this 350KW infrastructure companies like EVGo and EA were investing in, but if SSBs can charge faster at lower power then there is your answer.

I think we will see batteries settle in the 500 real world miles range, and if they can be topped off (to 80% or whatever, not necessarily a full charge) in 5 minutes or less, well, that combined with ubiquitous, wireless charging, is the future I see.

 

[ads75]

Battery swap is almost certainly not going to be part of the equation. Assuming it takes 5 min to perform, a line of 3-4 cars means it's faster to just DC charge.

Sounds like you are assuming there would be a line swap batteries but not DC charge. I’ve waited 30 minutes just to plug in a couple of times, and I have only taken the R1T on a couple of trips needing DCFC.

I don’t think battery swaps would happen, just seems too big/heavy/somewhat structural to the vehicle. I also think a battery swap station would require more space/infrastucture/power to support. I hate pulling up and waiting in line to DCFC. Could be worse if a battery swap station has no batteries, or the batteries aren’t fully charged and ready to swap.

 

[BigSkies]

Interesting about solid state batteries. I was skeptical of all this 350KW infrastructure companies like EVGo and EA were investing in, but if SSBs can charge faster at lower power then there is your answer.

I think we will see batteries settle in the 500 real world miles range, and if they can be topped off (to 80% or whatever, not necessarily a full charge) in 5 minutes or less, well, that combined with ubiquitous, wireless charging, is the future I see.

I think solid state will enable the 500 mile range vehicles. We'll probably start seeing them in luxury vehicles towards the end of the decade and mass market vehicles in the mid 2030's.

The technology seems very promising from an energy density standpoint and from a fast charging standpoint. However, I remain skeptical that they will be cheaper on a $/kWh basis. The solid state companies seem to be avoiding this question. So adding ~200 miles of range to a Rivian will still be and extra 100kWh of batteries. That's still $10k in cost at $100/kWh. Some people would be willing to pay that, but not on mass market cars.

I'm also pretty skeptical on wireless charging outside of niche use cases.

 

[jjswan33]

I think solid state will enable the 500 mile range vehicles. We'll probably start seeing them in luxury vehicles towards the end of the decade and mass market vehicles in the mid 2030's.

The technology seems very promising from an energy density standpoint and from a fast charging standpoint. However, I remain skeptical that they will be cheaper on a $/kWh basis. The solid state companies seem to be avoiding this question. So adding ~200 miles of range to a Rivian will still be and extra 100kWh of batteries. That's still $10k in cost at $100/kWh. Some people would be willing to pay that, but not on mass market cars.

I'm also pretty skeptical on wireless charging outside of niche use cases.

I think the technology is actually closer than many think.

Two examples:
1. The first portable solar generator, with Li-NMC SST cells. By estimate it is ~40% more energy dense than comparable products but with a cost premium of 25-30% or so. Yoshino
2. A company I invest in SLDP (a small investment and down 75% from when I bought it ), in there most recent q3 earnings they announced that they have shipped samples to BMW for 'automotive qualification'. Their tech sounds pretty cool to me, https://www.solidpowerbattery.com/. But who knows most of these companies will fail.

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