Currently, the biggest challenge with public charging stations is when an internal combustion engine car is taking up a charging spot so that an EV can not use it. This is what is meant when an EV driver mentions that a spot is ICEd.
Most public charging locations try to solve this problem by properly marking up their spots AND in some locations actually ticketing violators of their signage.
See this BMW X5 at the Americana at Brand –
and a close up of the ticket issued to the driver –
I really appreciate centers and police departments that enforce these EV only spots as it hopefully actively deters the practice of ICEd locations.
This is an easy violation to spot.
The thing that I believe we need to come up with a solution for is the fellow EV driver that picks a charger that blocks out others from being able to use either the parking spots or other EV chargers at the location. Let me attempt to explain this. If you have a charging port on the opposite side of the car where the charging station is and a charging station that is on the same side of the car, some drivers will pick the one closest to their charging port, EVEN IF doing so will effectively make a spot or another charger unavailable for the next car to use. I don’t know what to call this violation, but here are a few pictures:
At L.A. Live, Lot W (West Lot), I’ve seen this Plug-in Prius park in spot 2 while using the charger from spot 3 to charge with.
I made this crude diagram to demonstrate the point. The Os are the Blink EVSEs.
By using the charger in Spot 3 while parking in Spot 2, the plug in Prius effectively blocked out use of Spot 3 for MOST cars.
Here’s the same Prius doing the same thing at this location at another day –
To solve this, and to allow others, should they arrive I moved from Spot 1 and parked in Spot 3 and used Spot 2’s EVSE to charge to allow Spot 1 and Spot 4 to charge, should some other EVs need to take the spot.
BEFORE
AFTER
However our cords were crossed during this time, and would’ve been a hazard. Mr. or Ms. Plug-In-Prius could’ve solved this by just taking Spot 4, and this is exactly the point I am trying to make. Pay attention to how the spots are configured and ensure that the charger and spot you are taking will allow the maximum number of fellow EV drivers to park in the location.
I don’t know what we should call this sort of EV violation. It’s not ICEing the spot, since the car IS an EV (yes, even Plug-ins with Range Extenders (gas engine backups are such), however, the person needs to be more mindful of what they’re doing.
Another example can be seen at the Americana at Brand on Thursday, July 12. The same day that the BMW X5 above was ticketed for ICEing the spot.
This Volt was charging while parked in Spot 2 using the charger on Spot 1. I understand that their charging port is on the driver’s side, but if the other spots had been taken, another car MAY not have been able to park in Spot 1 to use the charger in Spot 2 without possibly crossing Spot 2. The driver of the Volt should have used the charger assigned to Spot 2 and left the charger in Spot 1 available for someone else to use.
The charger was available AND long enough to reach the Volt’s front Driver’s side charging port.
I don’t know if we have a word for this fellow EV driver erroneously using the wrong charger, but if all indications are correct and there will be more of us on the road, we really need to be more mindful of what EVSEs are appropriate for whatever parking spot we decided to take.
Currently, there are still not that many of us on the road sharing these public stations, but there are definitely more EV drivers than in the past. And the projected sales figures show a little over 3x as many this year as last year. So, the EV community needs to be more mindful of how to approach this inadvertent blocking of the precious few charging spots and locations to charge.
Ok, so I live in Long Beach, the southernmost city in Los Angeles County (and the county’s second largest city).
According to Google Maps, about 135 Mile Trip between home and some of the Chargepoint Public Chargers on Anacapa Street in Santa Barbara.
So, to make it from home to Santa Barbara and back in the same day, I would have to seriously plan this out AND have the time to execute.
Under ideal circumstances I MAY make it there, but after 4 months of driving the ActiveE I know that this is near impossible for the way that I drive, so I needed to PLAN my trip between the two locations AND have the time to charge each way AND midway.
So, what was my plan…
I’ve always attested that the range on the ActiveE is UNLIMITED… You just have to make sure that you have enough time to charge in between stops. My destination was 135 miles away, there are chargers about 60 miles away and another around 90 miles away, so I had identified two locations. Additionally, to charge for the difference, I figured that I would need at least two hours before my appointment to ensure that I feel confident that I would have enough charge to make it to my destination.
So, I identified two possible charging stations.
1) Thousand Oaks – Janss Marketplace, 275 N. Moorpark Rd, Thousand Oaks, CA 91360. These chargers are on the Blink Network, and showed up as available on the application. (About 60 miles from home)
2) Ventura, CA – Pacific View Mall, between Sears and Red Robin. These are some non-networked Clipper Creek chargers that I would not have known the status of, until I got there (there are several pay Chargepoint chargers in the City of Ventura (another 5 or so miles further, if I had been more daring).
At the start of the day, I just couldn’t get up early enough to charge for a few hours mid-route, so we ended up ICEing it up to Santa Barbara. The weather was nice and we at least went convertible, so there was something that the ICE did that the ActiveE did not to minimize my “guilt” over ignoring the ActiveE for the day.
After my lunch in Santa Barbara, I decided to do a survey of a few of the city of Santa Barbara charging stations. The stations themselves are free, but parking will cost money. The first 75 minutes are complimentary, and every hour (or fraction thereof is $1.50. Parking is limited to 72 hours continuously and the lots are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Pictures of the two Chargepoints at 1221 Anacapa St, Santa Barbara, California 93101
Down the street from there are a couple of other Chargepoint stations at 1115 Anacapa St, Santa Barbara, California 93101.
So, having surveyed a few spots to charge along the way to Santa Barbara. With enough time to wait in between, a weekend drive to Santa Barbara may well be in the plans for the future… I just have to get my car back from BMW Service since they’re taken it for its 10,000 mile checkup (and now replacing the e machine…).
As much as I love using the Chargepoint network from Coulomb and the feedback that their well designed IOS app (as well as the very good BlackBerry App), I find myself thankful that Blink also exists. It seems to me that the Blink Network is growing in Southern California. Aside from the chargers in my long drive test to Northern San Diego and the chargers that popped up in L.A. Live that I previously wrote about, it seems that the network just added six more chargers at the Americana at Brand.
and on the other view:
As of today, June 20, 2012. The spots are not yet complete, but according to the Blink Network App, all six chargers are online. All that seems to be missing is signage on the parking spots to mark them as EV parking spots. Something that the management company on the Grove did not initially do to their chargers (at least according to Recargo/Plugshare) pics that I have looked at before (it does look like the signage at the Grove is now up) Which means that the owners of the Americana are learning from their mistakes from the Grove (same ownership.) They have 12 spots blocked off and 6 chargers, so it may be ideal for plug-sharing. [Update June 21st, actually parked and charged my ActiveE here today. They shrank down the spots from 12 to six to match the number of chargers.] Works great.
Anyway Bravo to the owner of the Americana and the Grove in installing such a high concentration of EV chargers at their two premiere shopping destinations. The parking at the Americana is free for the first hour, then $3 for 61 minutes to 90 minutes hours, then $1 for every 30 minutes to a $9 maximum. So, it costs money to park, but not to charge. Some restaurants add 2 more hours of free parking to the 1 hour for a total of 3 hours of free parking (and charging.)
I wanted to see this for myself, so to test this, I went ahead and installed my portable GPS in the ActiveE and compared the velocity that it showed on the GPS with the speedometer of my ActiveE.
So, the first test was to do this on surface street speeds.
As you can see from the video, there is a discrepancy at lower speeds. So, I figured to try this on the freeway…
It looks like the folks on the BMW ActiveE forums were right. The car does overstate its speed to the tune of 3-5 mph.
With the Lakers early exit in the 2011-2012 season to the Oklahoma City Thunder, we found ourselves with some time to go to the “other” L.A. sport teams events. One of the other teams that my wife and I both enjoy is the Los Angeles Dodgers.
So, with some extra time on our hands, we went ahead and picked up a Dodgers Mini Plan. As part of the EV lifestyle that we’ve embraced, I was very interested in the charger infrastructure at Dodger Stadium and was embarassed by what I’ve found there… Nothing but legacy SPI chargers.
In Dodger Stadium Lot N, are four legacy chargers. So, the operational Rav4s and their brethren can still charge at Dodger Stadium, but the new breed of ActiveEs, Leaf, and Volts can not. To their credit, there is ONE 120V charger “available”, but the covered EV pictured here (is that a SmartCar?) is already using that charger.
Well, all is not lost. Thanks to the Reconnect CA program, public charger facilities with SP1 and other legacy chargers are able to upgrade the chargers at no cost to the charger owners. They just have to fulfill the requirements, a very good summary was provided at the ActiveE Forums by David Woo.
Basically, as I understand it.
The property owner has to have at least two legacy chargers and Clipper Creek and the State will replace one and leave one legacy behind at no charge to the property owner. The owner just has to agree to let Clipper Creek gather the usage information on the new charger.
Seems like a no-brainer. However, our friends at Dodger Stadium ownership have been embattled and just recently completed a change in ownership (thank goodness) and the Agreement to get the replacements in place are stuck on the Dodgers side. So, if you, like me, are a Dodger fan and would love to use the chargers at Lot N while going to the game. Contact your Dodger rep (season ticket office – 323-224-1365) and ask them to upgrade the EV chargers and direct them to Clipper Creek before the grant program runs out (now August 1, 2012.)
Now if you find some other qualifying public spots, see if the owner is aware of or interested in applying for the program. Or contact Stacey at Clipper Creek (info below.)
The Clipper Creek contact’s information is
Stacey Barhydt stacey@clippercreek.net
ClipperCreek, Inc.
Reconnect CA Program Support
530-887-1674 ex 300
So, it looks like some folks over at the Nissan Forums are not so interested in the Staples Playoff weekend, and in order to get them anyone else who may not be a Sports fan to the Charger information sooner, I’m reposting the sections on the TEN (10) Blink Network chargers at L.A. Live as well as updating some of the information.
[Updated for Kings game West Lot using a Kings pre-paid ticket, I believe that on game days, the parking at that lot is restricted to those attending the games during the game hours, but open otherwise.] The main takeaway from the game day update is this. You need to advise the attendant upon entry that you will be using the chargers. They will have you proceed forward and DOWN the level where they will then re-direct you to an exit and you will need to exit the garage at ground level and re-enter the same garage in Entry E. Pull a ticket and keep it on your car. Charge at the Blink charger as usual and you will need to exit the garage with the ticket that you took to enter the garage AND present your prepaid game parking ticket for Lot W so that they don’t charge you again for parking. It’s clear as mud.
Across the street from the Staples Center is L.A. Live. An entertainment, retail, restaurant, office, residential, and hotel complex par excellence. Currently charging is free, but the parking could be free (on non-game days AND with a minimum at one of the restaurants at the complex) to very expensive $30-$40 for the day.
At Staples Center, there lies a total of TEN (10) Blink Network Chargers. Now, I must reiterate that the Blink Network Chargers require two things to operate.
1) You need to have a Blink Card. (If you don’t have one, get one. They’re growing in SoCal, not as many as Chargepoint, but definitely growing.)
2) You need to use your ZIP Code to activate the charging process (like the Gas Stations you used to use when you pumped for gasoline.)
There are four chargers in the East Parking Lot.
Two in Parking Level 2 that are back to back from each other.
and
The other two are side by side in Parking Level 1.
There are four chargers in the West Parking Lot, these are at GROUND Level, around the corner from handicapped and the entrance. It’s almost adjacent to 11th Street. This lot is also known as Lot W for those holding a Staples Center tenant pre-paid parking pass.
Three face forward, and the fourth is by itself on a column.
Here is another shot with the ActiveE in the foreground.
And lastly, there are two chargers in Valet Parking at the Ritz Carlton/J.W. Marriott. Though the actual chargers are in L3 of the West Parking Lot.
One word of warning, the Valets at the Ritz are very helpful, but you need to instruct them on how to use your charger and how to check if it is working. The helpful valet that assisted me ALMOST did everything correctly, except he plugged me into a non-working EVSE. I had to move to the operational charger. Remember to give the Valet your Blink Card AND Zip Code to charge the car.
and here is the other charger at the hotel Valet Parking.
Here is a photo of the non-working Blink charger at L.A. Live hotel valet parking (it should be fixed by now), it was stuck trying to read the RFID card. [It took them a week from reporting to get it fixed, but looks like it is now.]
In the course of four days, Staples Center was hosting the NHL Western Conference Playoffs with now Stanley Cup bound Los Angeles Kings, the second round of the NBA Playoffs for the Los Angeles Lakers and the Los Angeles Clippers. Though the record ended up being a depressing 2-4 with the Clippers eliminated at home and the Lakers on the road on Monday. It made for an exciting sports-filled weekend.
Out of the six games this past weekend, we decided to try to make it to all six initially, but was too late to make it to the Thursday Night LA Kings victory.
So, we started our Downtown LA long weekend with the Fleming’s Steak House on Thursday night. A very good national steak house with a very good wine list. However, if you find yourself in the area, I prefer the Palm.
Friday night was our first game at Staples Center. It was my Los Angeles Lakers battling the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 3 of the Second Round.
The Lakers in-game production is quite a spectacle and it always starts with an awesome tip-off video like below –
At this point in the series, the Lakers were down 2-0 and needed a victory to regain the momentum of the series. We sat in our regular Section 216 seats for this game.
This was the playoffs, and the Lakers came in and executed in this game.
The Oklahoma City Thunder put long-time Lakers favorite Derek Fisher on Kobe Bryant in this game and my better half had some good shots of them together:
and
It does look like they gave each other high-fives here!
As with all Lakers games, we had our celebrities out as well
Denzel in his understated New York Yankees Hat.
Jack Nicholson in shades and Andy Garcia, not in his usual seats in Section 113, but courtside.
AC Green spotted in the crowd.
Penny Marshall with Denzel.
Thank goodness for a very hot shooting night from the free-throw line, the Lakers won this game and the series became 2-1.
So, game one of five of our weekend was complete…
Next up, was a 12:30 pm Saturday Clippers game against the San Antonio Spurs.
We sat in Section 210 for this game and there are some stark difference between Lakers and Clippers games. First, Staples Center is darkened for all but the court for Lakers games. The crowd sits in darkness, much like a boxing match, whereas the Clippers crowd is bathed in gymnasium lighting. Second, Clippers fans are a LOT louder than Lakers fans (side note, I AM A LAKER FAN.) That being said, I always root for the Clippers when they are not playing against my Lakers. However, I was not as emotionally invested in this game and the Clippers ended up blowing a rather sizable early lead to lose to the Spurs.
Here is an interesting crowd photo of our weekend, note the Clipper, Laker, and Kings attire in the crowd.
A photo from the seats to show what the view was like.
Not being familiar with who attends these games, I believe Billy Crystal is the big Clipper Celebrity fan, no shots of any celebs.
Game two of our weekend ended in a loss, so we were rather subdued, but had to take figure out what to do in downtown L.A. for four hours in between Clippers and Lakers games, so we decided to take in a movie at the Regal 14 at L.A. Live. We saw Battleship, which was a BAD movie with not enough explosions to redeem itself.
However, it did keep us cool and entertained while we get ourselves ready for the 7:30 pm tip of the first of two Staples Center doubleheaders that weekend.
Game three of five for us was the Los Angeles Lakers Game Four of the Second Round. This was a hard one to take for Lakers fans. The team lost this game on the home floor and had the victory in hand, before it was lost. We were in our regular Section 216 seats that evening.
Ashton Kutcher was courtside for game four. (I blame him for the loss ;-))
Andy Garcia was in his regular Section 113 seats. Maybe it is HIS fault, since he changed seats for this game versus Game 3 of the series! Perhaps he should’ve sat courtside again.
Either way, I and a few of my closest fellow Lakers fans were disappointed that evening.
Thus Game Three of our Five Games at Staples Center ended in a massive disappointment with the Lakers trailing the series 3-1. Still better than their Staples Center neighbors at 3-0, but Lakers fans don’t compare the team against other teams, they compare them against past Lakers Championship teams.
Another disappointing game, so we headed back home for some respite and hopeful that the Kings and Clippers can do better on Sunday… Boy were we wrong.
Sunday was an interesting day in this weekend of sports in that the Final leg of the AMGEN Tour of California bike race was ending at Staples Center/L.A. Live before the start of the Kings game.
So, I guess one could count the last leg as the Finals for this race.
Either way, we were back to Staples Center on Sunday for a 12 noon L.A. Kings Game 4 of the NHL Western Conference Finals versus the Phoenix Coyotes. The L.A. Kings, at this point were hoping to close out Phoenix and find themselves in the Stanley Cup for only the second time in their history.
Game Four of our Five Game Staples Playoff weekend was fun, however, the real Kings fans would’ve picked us up to be “new” fans. I was at the game with a short-sleeved shirt and was promptly chilly throughout the whole game. We sat at the San Manuel Club Restaurant above Section 215 for the game and enjoyed a bountiful and tasty brunch buffet as well as a good view of the game.
Our flickr stream has more photos, but I think video will give you a better feel.
Needless to say, Game Four of Five ended in a disappointment with the Kings ending up being shut out at home. At least we got a good meal, and great service at the San Manuel Club Restaurant at Staples Center.
Sunday was easier than the previous two days in that we got ourselves a room for Sunday night to Monday morning at the Ritz Carlton, L.A. Live. Parking is $40 valet only with in and out privileges.
Here is a panoramic shot of our room (on Monday morning).
The view from room 2358 for that weekend was quite nice.
So, after some rest at the Ritz, we went ahead and attended Game Five of our Five Playoff game Staycation in Downtown Los Angeles with our last game of the series with the Los Angeles Clippers hoping to stave off elimination against the San Antonio Spurs. Alas it was not meant to be…
We had great seats in Section 114 for this last game of the Clippers 2011-2012 season.
Once again, hats off to Clippers fans who seem to be louder than my fellow Lakers fans. And they really have a talented kid in Blake Griffin (pictured here defending Tim Duncan)
This is a nice panoramic crowd shot from my seat at Section 114.
Nice shot of the nearby basket.
At the end of the night, the Clippers succumbed to the San Antonio Spurs and were swept off the playoffs 4-0. Our weekend at Staples Center was a resounding thud with the Los Angeles home teams going 1-4. With the Lakers eventually losing Monday night in Oklahoma City and the Kings getting in the Stanley Cup with a road victory in Glendale, AZ versus the Phoenix Coyotes.
This conversion video from Youtube is rather impressive –
So. You may be asking yourself. Aside from four Los Angeles team losses, how does this past weekend relate to my ActiveE and EVs in general.
Well, it so happens that across the street from the Staples Center is L.A. Live. An entertainment, retail, restaurant, office, residential, and hotel complex par excellence. Currently charging is free, but the parking could be free (on non-game days AND with a minimum at one of the restaurants at the complex) to very expensive $30-$40 for the day.
At Staples Center, there lies a total of TEN (10) Blink Network Chargers. Now, I must reiterate that the Blink Network Chargers require two things to operate.
1) You need to have a Blink Card. (If you don’t have one, get one. They’re growing in SoCal, not as many as Chargepoint, but definitely growing.)
2) You need to use your ZIP Code to activate the charging process (like the Gas Stations you used to use when you pumped for gasoline.)
There are four chargers in the East Parking Lot.
Two in Parking Level 2 that are back to back from each other.
and
The other two are side by side in Parking Level 1.
There are four chargers in the West Parking Lot, these are at GROUND Level, around the corner from handicapped and the entrance. It’s almost adjacent to 11th Street.
Three face forward, and the fourth is by itself on a column.
And lastly, there are two chargers in Valet Parking at the Ritz Carlton/J.W. Marriott. Though the actual chargers are in L3 of the West Parking Lot.
One word of warning, the Valets at the Ritz are very helpful, but you need to instruct them on how to use your charger and how to check if it is working. The helpful valet that assisted me ALMOST did everything correctly, except he plugged me into a non-working EVSE. I had to move to the operational charger. Remember to give the Valet your Blink Card AND Zip Code to charge the car.
The Valet Parking is $40 for overnight guests. I don’t know what it is if you’re just visiting. Charging is free, however.
Here is my ActiveE in one of the valet spots:
and here is the other charger at the hotel Valet Parking.
Here is a photo of the non-working Blink charger at L.A. Live hotel valet parking (it should be fixed by now), it was stuck trying to read the RFID card.
It was an emotionally draining weekend and we were glad to have been able to get a room at the Ritz on Sunday night. Los Angeles home victories would’ve been sweeter, alas, one of the three teams are still playing in their playoffs and were looking ahead to the next season.
Been meaning to write another of these posts in a while. I had a good time this past weekend at L.A. Live, and thought to write about that, but decided instead to write about Santa Monica Place/Third Street Promenade first. MKnoll on the BMW Forums had a quick post on things she does in Santa Monica, which inspired me to go with what I would recommend in that area for #2 in this series. As a quick refresher, #1 was at the Helms Bakery District for breakfast at La Dijonaise…
The EV Chargers that I use in Santa Monica are in the lot corner Broadway and 4th Street (Santa Monica City Lot 7). It is in the ground level onramp toward the second level. There are four Chargepoint Network Coulomb chargers and One Clipper Creek J1772 charger. These Chargepoint chargers (at the time of my visit) are the older ones that do GFCI trip at times and it may take several attempts before the charge process takes. The Clipper Creek works great, but, as a good EV citizen, I only use those if all the Chargepoints are taken since all BMW ActiveE drivers are provided at least one Chargepoint RFID card to use, and I’m sure not all EV drivers have those.
The parking at the Santa Monica Place lots are Free for 2 hours 8 am to 6pm ($1 ea additional 30 minutes; $9 maximum daily) and $5 flat rate after 6pm. Zengo provides free valet parking, but that defeats the purpose of great food by public chargers.
I figure #2 should be a place for brunch… namely Zengo. This place has a highly rated brunch and though I’ve been there for brunch, I prefer the dinner service. Additionally, next door to Zengo is it’s sister restaurant La Sandia, I’ve only had dinner at La Sandia and I was not as fond of the food there.
As I like to leave the better option last, I will cover La Sandia quickly here. Basically, the food was interesting, but I felt that it was somewhat overpriced and really a better bar experience than food experience.
The Kiwi Margarita was very good –
As was the Mango Margarita
This was the Guacamole Sampler that we tried… And yes, they had the edible insect on it on purpose (I ate these, the better half skipped on it)
I went with the Chili Relleno, which was top-notch, but I felt that it was a bit over-priced.
And the better half decided to go with the Carnitas Tacos. Again, tasty, just over-priced.
All the photos that I have included in this article will be from dinner service that I had there earlier in the month.
So, brunch at Zengo is very popular aside from great food also provides unlimited drinks in its weekend brunches. The fine print on the menu states – that the unlimited brunch has a 2 hour time limit per table, the entire table must participate in it, it includes unlimited small plates & brunch cocktails- bloody mary / bacon bloody mary / mango mimosa / traditional mimosa / sake sangria / lychee bellini for $35 per guest. Thus if you like the things listed, it makes for a great deal.
When we went for brunch, we opted A La Carte as not everyone in the party would have made full use of the brunch deal. However, I do intend to take them up on that deal one of these days.
As I previously mentioned, I actually prefer the dinner at Zengo. The servers are very good at explaining that Zengo translates to Give and Take in English, I boil down Zengo’s dining experience as Latin-Asian Tapas. Their menu is split between smaller and larger plates and the mainstays stick around in the dinner menu and every month and a half to two months, they add a special “tasting kitchen” menu inspired by one Asian location and another Latin location, such as Hanoi and Havana (April 9 – June 30, 2012) or the previous menu of Shanghai and Sao Paulo.
On our third trip to Zengo, we had some dishes that stayed with us from the previous trip and we felt compelled to order again, and the Peking Duck-Daikon Tacos stood out from our previous experiences, and it was, once again, excellent.
Here is the Peking Duck-Daikon Taco ready to eat on my plate:
and another one
We decided on pairing our dinner with a Malbec that we found to be light in tannins, smooth, and very good with meat and duck.
We decided to go to the Pork Belly Steamed Buns next. I was expecting Char Shiu Bao, but got this instead:
And it was wonderful.
One thing that through us off was the next course, which I did not expect to be in a soup/broth form was from this Hanoi and Havana test kitchen menu of Morcillas. I had no indigation that it was in a soup/broth format and was my least favorite in the meal, but it was still very well executed.
We ended our mains with the Wok Fried Rice and it was excellent. It’s a main on it’s own, though normally a side in many Asian restaurants.
We did get dessert, but did not quite make the photo gallery. If you want to see more Zengo pictures just head over to my flickr gallery.
After a fun dinner like we had that evening, and since the parking is paid for the rest of the evening, a nice stroll down 3rd Street Promenade or some shopping at Santa Monica Place is quite easy to do from this location. Additionally, the Santa Monica Pier is also very close and navigable at this point.
For this particular evening, we opted to go to a nearby AMC Theater to catch the Avengers again. It made for a great date night with the better half.
After dinner and a movie, we got back onto our fully-charged ActiveE to head home.
Didn’t get a chance to post much (or drive much) this week as I’ve been on a business trip to Chicago…
Here are some pictures we took before the trip. My sister and her family were over and my brother-in-law, who is a car guy, was daring enough to take apart parts of the car to take a look… mainly the plastic cover thing, so I snapped some pics of the “engine” area of the ActiveE.
Additionally, it did provide me with the opportunity to get some updated pictures from my better half. She had her first day with the ActiveE and was a trooper.
She found LAX Lot 6 and was able to get us plugged in for the recharge for the drive back home.
and to verify that it was plugged in fine. She did a video of the blue blinking light of happiness!
Lastly, ’cause she thought it looked cool and teased me (I hope) with what she tells me she wants for her next car.
Yes, a Fisker Karma, what can I say, the better half has great taste!
It’s time for an update. As a response to my $0.31 per kWh price for charging my ActiveE on Southern California Edison’s Domestic Tariff, I signed up for Electric Time Of Use (TOU). Now there are TWO flavors of the TOU tariff. One requires a separate meter, the other does not. The approximate cost for the separate meter and installation at my house was an additional $2,000 to $4,000. Since, we were not sure if we would be staying on Electric after the two year closed-end lease of the ActiveE, we decided to go with the one offered for customers with a single electric meter. At this point, barring the lack of good choices after the 2 years, we probably will go ahead and get at least a replacement electric vehicle.
So what did we find out after the first month on the new tariff. First, let me spell out what assumptions were made to calculate the amount of energy used by the AE. I could have gotten more detailed (counting ALL the emailed kWh usage identified by my Chargepoint EVSE, but decided that I did not really want to do all the calculations and since most of my charging is done at the super-off peak hours and very few outside of these times, that I would overstate the amount of energy and calculate based on the total super-off peak usage AND 10% of off-peak charging to come up with my model.) but I would’ve run out of room on the back of the napkin. Bottom line, in the new month, I came up with $0.12024 per kWh to charge this past month under the winter rates. This assumption puts me at the cost to fill up at home at $1.20 per day
So, using the 70 mile number – from my electric cost per mile last month is approximately $0.01714 per mile. After two months of driving, I have noticed that my average roundtrip is actually a little higher than the 70 mile number. Let’s call it 85 miles… So, using this mileage, I was able to recalculate this cost down to $0.01412 per mile.
Using the revised mileage numbers, 407 miles is $5.75 vs. $60.00 approximately 1/12th the cost of ICE.
Folks with lower kWh pricing obviously come out a lot more. In fact, it’s practically free for those that are on solar power, though not really free, since installing solar DOES cost money. Now that BMW got a nice group discount at 35%, but still not “free.”
Of course the subsidized power may disappear as electric cars gain greater traction, but there’s a lot of room to go before it gets close to the same level as an ICE car of a similar caliber. Additionally, it would seem that my rates are bound to go up when Summer Rates kick in, so I will have another update when those bills come in.
