If we allow fully electric vehicles on our motorways then for sure some of them are going to fail going up a steep hill. Should the highways agency be planning to install charging points at the bottom of all hills do you think??
The hiccup is one of rate of transfer of energy - the speed to refuel a petrol car means the service station borders on the burn rate equivalent to a modest power station
(call it 10 killowatt hours per litre for unleaded and easy nos, so a 3/4 fil up of say 30 litres is 300 kWhrs. In 180 seconds = 1/20 of an hour, so ~ 6 megawatts delivery rate per pump. At the motorway services, perhaps 5-10 cars may be filling at once when busy).
It is quite practical to fill up in 3 minutes, and in 2 more to have paid and be driving off.
Now an electric car needs less KVA, being more efficient, perhaps more like 30kVA per good charge, but even so unless you have a battery swap scheme, recharging mid-journey is a much slower business, so at any time, more cars will be parked up and buzzing merrily for an hour or so at a time - so filling up at home before you even get in it has some appeal.
typical family EV has a charge rate of 23mph (so to put enough in for a 23mile range takes an hour sitting on charge) or more like 100 miles in an hour if fast charge is available. Not exactly quick, if you are going a long way.
The hiccup is one of rate of transfer of energy - the speed to refuel a petrol car means the service station borders on the burn rate equivalent to a modest power station
(call it 10 killowatt hours per litre for unleaded and easy nos, so a 3/4 fil up of say 30 litres is 300 kWhrs. In 180 seconds = 1/20 of an hour, so ~ 6 megawatts delivery rate per pump. At the motorway services, perhaps 5-10 cars may be filling at once when busy).
It is quite practical to fill up in 3 minutes, and in 2 more to have paid and be driving off.
Now an electric car needs less KVA, being more efficient, perhaps more like 30kVA per good charge, but even so unless you have a battery swap scheme, recharging mid-journey is a much slower business, so at any time, more cars will be parked up and buzzing merrily for an hour or so at a time - so filling up at home before you even get in it has some appeal.
typical family EV has a charge rate of 23mph (so to put enough in for a 23mile range takes an hour sitting on charge) or more like 100 miles in an hour if fast charge is available. Not exactly quick, if you are going a long way.
