Ebike charging using Street EV chargers for electric cars

[flecc]

The last thing we need are a load of 2 tonne electric cars to shift one person around a few km here and a few km there. Electric bikes make much more sense as you use a thousand times less energy than an electric car.

Forget that, the e-cars are going to be an essential part of the supply system and all governments are planning that way, including the UK's. See the last paragraph in this post above.

We'll all be driving our own e-cars way into the future.
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[vulcanears]

I've no experience with car chargers but I assume they can be locked at both ends to prevent tampering.

I wonder if your main challenge with a bike would be stopping some little scrote from nicking your charger or just unplugging it for "shits 'n' giggles"!

Would you be camping on organised campsites? If so, blagging some overnight 240v would be perfectly reasonable.

Harder if you're wild camping....

I would have to find a way to hard-mount a waterproof charger to the bike with security bolts. Grin's cycle satiator is waterproof and has mounting holes, but it's really expensive.

I do both wild camping, campsites and sometimes hotels. I regularly cover 100 miles per day, so having recharging options is always handy. And I already carry 2 batteries - taking a third one is not really an option.

 

[WheezyRider]

Forget that, the e-cars are going to be an essential part of the supply system and all governments are planning that way, including the UK's. The the last paragraph in this post above.
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Yep, depressing isn't it? Complete lack of vision or understanding. Clueless government numpties (of all political colours) bamboozled by promises of people pushing expensive unproven tech.

The problem comes when people start needing the grid for heating as well as transport. Yes, cars can feed some power back into the grid, but enough to cope with power demand during a cold snap? If we get another "beast from the east" I can see a lot of people having serious problems...perhaps even a large number of deaths - we have the worst housing stock in Europe in terms of insulation.

We need to take a route of energy use reduction. This means proper insulation of houses so they need absolutely minimal heating (if any) and using transport that is efficient and solves a number of other problems at the same time (ie e-bikes).

But that isn't so sexy and on the face of it, doesn't look like it promotes ever increasing debt financed by promised perpetual growth...

/Rant over again...sorry about that...

 

[Gavin]

Interesting thoughts there

Theres already queuing at some charge points and charging companies asking the hybrid drivers to give way to full e-cars.



That isn't the problem it might appear to be. E-cars have charge timers which can be set for various times and some electricity suppliers offer cheaper late times, spreading the load. Half cheap rate after midnight for example, when almost no-one else is using current.

There will also be the increasing number using solar panels and home powerpacks storing the charge current.

And also the increasing number of e-cars sharing their battery current with the grid for profit. Denmark already has this up and running. The grid draws from e-cars out of use at peak demand times and repaying a high rate. The car owner charges at cheap rate overnight and their profit is comes as a deduction from their electricity bill.
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Some interesting points there @flecc and I must confess I hadn't considered the solar element.

Denmark isn't necessarily a good comparison with the UK however- lower population density, higher concentration of urban living (implying shorter commutes) and much stronger "green" movement.

I'd stick to my guns regarding power surge however. I remember speaking to a guy at "Fully Charged Live" last year who worked for Tesla. When I really pushed him on the subject he admitted (through gritted teeth) that to fully charge a Tesla takes approx 6KW for between 4 and 6 hours. Multiply that 6KW with the 30 million cars on UK roads and you've got quite a power surge, even allowing for solar. At the moment, UKPN already have to spark up Dinorwig at the end of Eastenders every night and most kettles don't draw 6KW....

Another consideration is regarding vehicles paying back into the grid- that all counts as a discharge, thus reducing the life-cycle of the battery. With that in mind, I wonder how many people would want to shorten the life-span of a £100K Tesla just to pay back to the grid....

 

[Gavin]

I would have to find a way to hard-mount a waterproof charger to the bike with security bolts. Grin's cycle satiator is waterproof and has mounting holes, but it's really expensive.

I do both wild camping, campsites and sometimes hotels. I regularly cover 100 miles per day, so having recharging options is always handy. And I already carry 2 batteries - taking a third one is not really an option.

Wow, that's serious mileage for a holiday! This is a glimpse into the future for all of us and really highlights the limitations of EV's for longer journeys.

Personally (in your situation) I'd be charging at a campsite overnight then at a caff when wild camping/ sightseeing. I wouldn't want to leave my bike chained to a charge point because I think it would attract too much attention....

 

[WheezyRider]

Interesting thoughts there


Some interesting points there @flecc and I must confess I hadn't considered the solar element.

Denmark isn't necessarily a good comparison with the UK however- lower population density, higher concentration of urban living (implying shorter commutes) and much stronger "green" movement.

I'd stick to my guns regarding power surge however. I remember speaking to a guy at "Fully Charged Live" last year who worked for Tesla. When I really pushed him on the subject he admitted (through gritted teeth) that to fully charge a Tesla takes approx 6KW for between 4 and 6 hours. Multiply that 6KW with the 30 million cars on UK roads and you've got quite a power surge, even allowing for solar. At the moment, UKPN already have to spark up Dinorwig at the end of Eastenders every night and most kettles don't draw 6KW....

Another consideration is regarding vehicles paying back into the grid- that all counts as a discharge, thus reducing the life-cycle of the battery. With that in mind, I wonder how many people would want to shorten the life-span of a £100K Tesla just to pay back to the grid....

We are already screwed if everyone turns on their kettle at the same time. A typical 2.2kW kettle and ~25 million homes, that's more than the UK's generating capacity at the moment, including the cable link from the continent.

Just think, if everyone gets an IoT kettle and the Chinese/Russians/North Koreans...hack them as their security is usually crap, they could easily crash the national grid system

Post Brexit, I imagine we will be paying a lot more for electricity as the French will charge whatever they like for power over the interconnect.

 

[WheezyRider]

I would have to find a way to hard-mount a waterproof charger to the bike with security bolts. Grin's cycle satiator is waterproof and has mounting holes, but it's really expensive.

I do both wild camping, campsites and sometimes hotels. I regularly cover 100 miles per day, so having recharging options is always handy. And I already carry 2 batteries - taking a third one is not really an option.

Nice mileage... Not sure what you mean about the charger? Can you not just use a normal mains charger and put it in a plastic bag? Or are you worried about recharging out doors from a street charger in the rain?

I think it wouldn't be too difficult to make something to prevent casual theft/interference.

 

[vulcanears]

Nice mileage... Not sure what you mean about the charger? Can you not just use a normal mains charger and put it in a plastic bag? Or are you worried about recharging out doors from a street charger in the rain?

I think it wouldn't be too difficult to make something to prevent casual theft/interference.

Someone above mentioned the risk of having your charger stolen when anyone walking past can just unplug it. So my response to that was to screw the charger to the frame somehow. I'm not overly concerned with that, because the benefits of street-charging would outweigh the risk for me.

 

[flecc]

And I have to challenge you back!

Denmark isn't necessarily a good comparison with the UK however- lower population density, higher concentration of urban living (implying shorter commutes) and much stronger "green" movement.

86% of Britain's population live in towns and cities, so any difference from Denmark is insignificant. And just like the Danes, the Brits will become just as "green" when they scent cheaper electricity via their compulsory e-car battery.

I'd stick to my guns regarding power surge however. I remember speaking to a guy at "Fully Charged Live" last year who worked for Tesla. When I really pushed him on the subject he admitted (through gritted teeth) that to fully charge a Tesla takes approx 6KW for between 4 and 6 hours. Multiply that 6KW with the 30 million cars on UK roads and you've got quite a power surge, even allowing for solar. At the moment, UKPN already have to spark up Dinorwig at the end of Eastenders every night and most kettles don't draw 6KW....

But it's not 30 million cars, most of our cars stand idle almost all their life, a huge proportion only used some days a week and then often only for very short trips. That's why they are ideal for sharing with the grid, a huge quantity of current just sitting around.

Average annual car mileage for females under 6000 a year, for males 9000 a year. That's 120/180 miles per week respectively with most newer e-cars having those ranges and more already on one charge. I only charge my over two year old e-car once a week at most, charging when it gets below half charged.

Another consideration is regarding vehicles paying back into the grid- that all counts as a discharge, thus reducing the life-cycle of the battery. With that in mind, I wonder how many people would want to shorten the life-span of a £100K Tesla just to pay back to the grid....

Again that is not the case, e-car battery life has been astonishing everyone. Nervous about this at the outset, the makers used low density cells to avoid such stresses and just as cautiously set a five year warranty. But when they sailed past five years with NO capacity loss they increased the warranties to eight years. But now the earliest ones are reaching ten years and sometimes with no capacity loss, they are having to think again. Some of those have been charged daily over all the years. Best example is the taxi firm who tried an early Leaf for the huge fuel cost saving and after seeing how well it lasted in the initial years bought four more, retaining a diesel only for the occasional very distance long trip. With taxi use they will have been charging seven days a week, on the oldest one for nearing ten years on the original battery which still shows full capacity on its capacity meter.

So no-one is going to be worried about sharing the battery of their lightly used car with the grid.

But even when at end of warranty life they are not scrap, they are down to 75% capacity and are then used in the home powerpacks that solar panel users have when they go on for years, being very useful.

Being an environmentalist from early days I ripped out gas fifty years ago to go all electric. My car's battery could run my home for two days in the depths of winter and five days in summer, showing how useful they can be to the grid.

With currently impeding battery sizes when we've all switched to e-cars, there will often be an idle 800 megawatts or more at peak demand times, just like having a large new nuclear station. And that's before the batteries have grown much larger in capacity, which they probably will.
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[WheezyRider]

Someone above mentioned the risk of having your charger stolen when anyone walking past can just unplug it. So my response to that was to screw the charger to the frame somehow. I'm not overly concerned with that, because the benefits of street-charging would outweigh the risk for me.

Here's an example of the sort of thing you can do. I wanted to get my Silverfish style battery mounted onto the frame of my bike, but have it so that it would be difficult to steal if left the bike outside the shops, but also could be removed as needed, without a major headache.

So I 3D printed some clamp on brackets to fit the frame and then a carrier which bolts into the Silverfish rail system and also bolts onto the brackets. It would be just as easy to adapt something like this to add a tamper proof charger.

 

[WheezyRider]

And I have to challenge you back!



86% of Britain's population live in towns and cities, so any difference from Denmark is insignificant. And just like the Danes, the Brits will become just as "green" when they scent cheaper electricity via their compulsory e-car battery.



But it's not 30 million cars, most of our cars stand idle almost all their life, a huge proportion only used some days a week and then often only for very short trips. That's why they are ideal for sharing with the grid, a huge quantity of current just sitting around.

Average annual car mileage for females under 6000 a year, for males 9000 a year. That's 120/180 miles per week respectively with most newer e-cars having those ranges and more already on one charge. I only charge my over two year old e-car once a week at most, charging when it gets below half charged.



Again that is not the case, e-car battery life has been astonishing everyone. Nervous about this at the outset, the makers used low density cells to avoid such stresses and just as cautiously set a five year warranty. But when they sailed past five years with NO capacity loss they increased the warranties to eight years. But now the earliest ones are reaching ten years and sometime with no capacity loss, they are having to think again. Some of those have been charged daily over all the years. Best example is the taxi firm who tried an early Leaf for the huge fuel cost saving and after seeing how well it lasted in the initial years bought four more, retaining a diesel only for the occasional very distance long trip. With taxi use they will have been charging seven days a week, on the oldest one for nearing ten years on the original battery which still shows full capacity on its capacity meter.

So no-one is going to be worried about sharing the battery of their lightly use car with the grid.

But even when at end of warranty life they are not scrap, they are down to 75% capacity and are then used in the home powerpacks that solar panel users have when they go on for years, being very useful.

Being an environmentalist from early days I ripped out gas fifty years ago to go all electric. My car's battery could run my home for two days in the depths of winter and five days in summer, showing how useful they can be to the grid.

With currently impeding battery sizes when we've all switched to e-cars, there will often be an idle 800 megawatts or more at peak demand times, just like having a large new nuclear station. And that's before the batteries have grown much larger in capacity, which they probably will.
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So 800MW is a nice little chunk of change, but it's a drop in the ocean. Have a look at these admittedly simplistic back of the envelope calculations and it will give you an idea of the problem we face:

Total no. of homes in GB (Ignoring NI): 25 m (from ONS)

Total no. of cars & vans in GB (Ignoring NI): ~33 m (from DoT) (not including HGVs, Buses or taxis)

Peak generating capacity required if all homes are converted to electricity for space & water heating:

- To replace gas boiler of 27 kW with electricity (assume 80% efficiency gas and 100% efficiency with electricity): 27x10e3 x 25x10e6 x 0.8 = 540 GW

- If electricity used to drive ground source heat pump with COP reducing energy input requirement by factor of 3: 540/3 = 180 GW

Peak generating capacity required if all cars and vans are electric and need mains charging:

- Of 33m registered vehicles, assume two thirds are used on a daily basis. If connected to mains with 13 A plug (~3kW): 22x10e6 x 3x10e3 = 66 GW

If connected to mains with 30 A plug (~7kW): 22x10e6 x 7x10e3 = 154 GW

Worst case scenario: Peak capacity required: 694 GW

Best case scenario: Peak capacity required: 246 GW

Current UK generating capacity, including interconnects: 45 to 50 GW


So I can see a massive shortfall. This does not even include Industrial use etc.

I think what we will be looking at in the future is for everyone to have a smart meter that throttles personal energy supply to each household, effectively rationing our energy.

 

[flecc]

- Of 33m registered vehicles, assume two thirds are used on a daily basis.

This bit you've got wrong for various reasons. Firstly no more than a half of cars are used daily, and even then certainly not seven days a week. And when they are used it's almost always only for a very small fraction of an e-car battery's mileage capacity (see what I posted about mileages and charge frequency). And then there's the distribution of charging times spreading the load, they'll never be all charging at once. Nor will they ever all be fully charging at once daily since they don't do remotely enough mileage to achieve that.

Even now the typical new e-car current offering has 200 miles of easily usable range, with the capability of much more. That 200 miles is 73,000 miles a year and who ever does anything like that? The current nett UK average annual car mileage is 7500 miles, just over one tenth that 73K. Ergo one tenth the charge need.

I think what we will be looking at in the future is for everyone to have a smart meter that throttles personal energy supply to each household, effectively rationing our energy.

We'll probably have that as well, in part to encourage adoption of solar panels and home powerpacks.

The other introduction possible is something that already exists in some locations in the world. Large congested cities restricted to every second day personal car usage.
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[Gavin]

And I have to challenge you back!



86% of Britain's population live in towns and cities, so any difference from Denmark is insignificant. And just like the Danes, the Brits will become just as "green" when they scent cheaper electricity via their compulsory e-car battery.



But it's not 30 million cars, most of our cars stand idle almost all their life, a huge proportion only used some days a week and then often only for very short trips. That's why they are ideal for sharing with the grid, a huge quantity of current just sitting around.

Average annual car mileage for females under 6000 a year, for males 9000 a year. That's 120/180 miles per week respectively with most newer e-cars having those ranges and more already on one charge. I only charge my over two year old e-car once a week at most, charging when it gets below half charged.



Again that is not the case, e-car battery life has been astonishing everyone. Nervous about this at the outset, the makers used low density cells to avoid such stresses and just as cautiously set a five year warranty. But when they sailed past five years with NO capacity loss they increased the warranties to eight years. But now the earliest ones are reaching ten years and sometime with no capacity loss, they are having to think again. Some of those have been charged daily over all the years. Best example is the taxi firm who tried an early Leaf for the huge fuel cost saving and after seeing how well it lasted in the initial years bought four more, retaining a diesel only for the occasional very distance long trip. With taxi use they will have been charging seven days a week, on the oldest one for nearing ten years on the original battery which still shows full capacity on its capacity meter.

So no-one is going to be worried about sharing the battery of their lightly use car with the grid.

But even when at end of warranty life they are not scrap, they are down to 75% capacity and are then used in the home powerpacks that solar panel users have when they go on for years, being very useful.

Being an environmentalist from early days I ripped out gas fifty years ago to go all electric. My car's battery could run my home for two days in the depths of winter and five days in summer, showing how useful they can be to the grid.

With currently impeding battery sizes when we've all switched to e-cars, there will often be an idle 800 megawatts or more at peak demand times, just like having a large new nuclear station. And that's before the batteries have grown much larger in capacity, which they probably will.
.

Oh dear Flecc/ Wheezy, I think we've taken this thread mightily off topic (sorry Vulcan)!

I think the views you put foward Flecc are those of an idealist, and I think it's very commendable that you've clearly decided to "be the change that you want to see in the world" (to quote Ghandi) so many years ago. The sad reality however is that very few people share your view (as a percentage of the UK population) and so will need to be forced to take it.

The "joined up" system that you describe (with vehicles, homes and industry all interlinked) has been around (in principle) since the 1970's. It's a fantastic concept, and one that I wholeheartedly agree with, and yet no UK government has had the political will to even scratch around the edges, let alone deliver meaningful progress.

EV's are undeniably gaining traction (no pun intended) but the attached link shows a depressing story....

UK electric car registrations surge in August but it’s a long road to zero and barriers must be addressed

UK new car market falls -1.6% in August, to 92,573 registrations. Good news for zero emission vehicle uptake, with registrations up nearly fivefold to take record 3.4% market share as hybrids also register growth. Industry calls for policies and measures to boost uptake of latest, lowest...

www.smmt.co.uk

As shown in those SMMT figures, for most people (sadly that includes me), an electric vehicle is a financial gamble, and from a cost/(financial) benefit perspective it makes no sense as a sole means of transport.

The only way to deliver the sort of change you're describing is to force it over the long term. Very difficult in a liberal democracy with a five-year parliamentary term....

 

[flecc]

The only way to deliver the sort of change you're describing is to force it over the long term. Very difficult in a liberal democracy with a five-year parliamentary term....

It will happen, both by persuasion and force. The i.c. car purchase deadline has already been brought forward to match others at 2035 and whatever it's necessary to juggle to achieve that will be done. This scene has to be watched very closely to see what is going on all the time and mostly people are way behind on that.

For example, did you know that green number plates for e-cars will be in from October? Bet you didn't. That's the precursor for e-cars to be given preferential treatment and i.c car drivers to be worse off.

I'm far from being an unthinking idealist. For example I got the subject of windpower completely wrong when I posted that the maintenance and installation costs would prevent the government getting to their forecast 10% of energy from the 3% at that time. I was completely wrong on both, the maintenance costs of the newer more efficient turbine designs have slashed costs and the government have achieved a miracle in getting to touching 20% of energy in such a short space of time.

That showed what they can do, hence my confidence.
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[WheezyRider]

This bit you've got wrong for various reasons. Firstly no more than a half of cars are used daily, and even then certainly not seven days a week. And when they are used it's almost always only for a very small fraction of an e-car battery's mileage capacity (see what I posted about mileages and charge frequency). And then there's the distribution of charging times spreading the load, they'll never be all charging at once. Nor will they ever all be fully charging at once daily since they don't do remotely enough mileage to achieve that.

Even now the typical new e-car current offering has 200 miles of easily usable range, with the capability of much more. That 200 miles is 73,000 miles a year and who ever does anything like that? The current nett UK average annual car mileage is 7500 miles, just over one tenth that 73K. Ergo one tenth the charge need.



We'll probably have that as well, in part to encourage adoption of solar panels and home powerpacks.

The other introduction possible is something that already exists in some locations in the world. Large congested cities restricted to every second day personal car usage.
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With apologies to Vulcan for going off on a tangent...

I agree Flecc, the numbers put into this model above are very much a worst case scenario, looking at PEAK possible demand. It's important to note that this model is about peak energy rather than overall energy use. Any system has to be mindful of the peak demand that may be asked of it at any given time.

However, there are number of things to consider. The proportion of power required for vehicles will be considerably less than the demand for domestic heating and this is something of a ticking time bomb as we head towards 2030. I have not included HGVs, buses, taxis etc, or industrial energy requirements in the model. As we order more stuff online, home deliveries are going up and up. Also, people will tend to want to keep their vehicle topped up, so even if they haven't used a full charge, the natural thing will be for people to come home from work and plug in...at roughly the same time, creating a big spike at the end of each working day.

What worries me about the smart meter power rationing that will also charge per kWh according to system demand is that the people who are well off and can afford to buy solar panels and home power walls etc will be fine, but people who can't afford them will be screwed. We already have a lot of people that live in fuel poverty. If people are only allowed a small amount of power and it's not enough to heat their homes (eg the elderly), they could die of cold. Also, as the planet warms we will need air con to stop the old from dying of heat.

 

[flecc]

It's important to note that this model is about peak energy rather than overall energy use. Any system has to be mindful of the peak demand that may be asked of it at any given time. Also, people will tend to want to keep their vehicle topped up, so even if they haven't used a full charge, the natural thing will be for people to come home from work and plug in...at roughly the same time, creating a big spike at the end of each working day. I have not included HGVs, buses, taxis etc, or industrial energy requirements in the model. As we order more stuff online, home deliveries are going up and up.

As I remarked to Gavin, one has to be very close to this subject to know what is already going on. E-cars will never be allowed to create peak demand. There'll be more time/price fixing of overnight supplies. There'll be more charging at work, spreading charge times, with the chargers then able to operate only at the most suitable times of the day. There'll be more large charging stations with huge area solar roof tops, already happening. There'll be more solar and powerpack homes allowing some independence of supply. And sharing e-car batteries with the grid will grow and grow.

Some of the things you mention are self compensating. For example, when I order online as I so often do, either it'll be click and collect using my car, or it will be delivered in a van, not both.

However, there are number of things to consider. The proportion of power required for vehicles will be considerably less than the demand for domestic heating and this is something of a ticking time bomb as we head towards 2030.

I agree, a problem as yet without a solution.
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[WheezyRider]

As I remarked to Gavin, one has to be very close to this subject to know what is already going on. E-cars will never be allowed to create peak demand. There'll be more time/price fixing of overnight supplies. There'll be more charging at work, spreading charge times, with the chargers then able to operate only at the most suitable times of the day. There'll be more large charging stations with huge area solar roof tops, already happening. There'll be more solar and powerpack homes allowing some independence of supply. And sharing e-car batteries with the grid will grow and grow.

Some of the things you mention are self compensating. For example, when I order online as I so often do, either it'll be click and collect using my car, or it will be delivered in a van, not both.



I agree, a problem as yet without a solution.
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The sad thing is a lot of this complex and expensive infrastructure is unnecessary. If people were just encouraged to use e-bikes and given incentives for being car free households we would be a lot healthier and the wasteful use of resources involved in using electric cars wouldn't be so great.

 

[Gavin]

As an aside from this (genuinely interesting) debate Flecc (or anyone else for that matter)....the "generator-in-trailer" idea I suggested in post #3. If the generator were running and charging/ being towed by an EAPC compliant cycle.....would the whole contraption be legal?

Have I just invented the world's cheapest IC/EV hybrid?!

 

[WheezyRider]

As an aside from this (genuinely interesting) debate Flecc (or anyone else for that matter)....the "generator-in-trailer" idea I suggested in post #3. If the generator were running and charging/ being towed by an EAPC compliant cycle.....would the whole contraption be legal?

Have I just invented the world's cheapest IC/EV hybrid?!

No, already thought of it. It is illegal.

 

[flecc]

The sad thing is a lot of this complex and expensive infrastructure is unnecessary. If people were just encouraged to use e-bikes and given incentives for being car free households we would be a lot healthier and the wasteful use of resources involved in using electric cars wouldn't be so great.

Never going to happen of course, especially with governments integrating e-cars into the future grid supplies across Europe, Suddenly car drivers are becoming very handy for a change!

And of course there's always a fair number who just can't use bikes or for whom their jouneys are impractical for cycling. Even in the cycling mad Netherlands that's 30% of the population.
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