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Installing EV Charging Units in Petrol Stations

Roger B
Petrol stations have various strict requirements regarding their electrical installations for obvious reasons. How will adding a MW size supply for a few high power chargers be dealt with, separation? Will earth leakage currents be a problem? If I remember correctly the reason the canopys are so high is to move the lighting into a different zone.
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    It amuses the guys I work with that I have a Tom Tom Sat Nav as they use their phones for everything including as a Sat Nav.


    i bought the all singing, all dancing Tom Tom that has a Cell connection and a WiFi connection as well as a Bluetooth connection to my phone, it updates very frequently using the WiFi at home including EV charging points. So long as the EV chargers are listed I would expect the Sat Nav to show them.

    https://www.tomtom.com/products/ev-charging-availability-routing-services/


    I have seen a couple of Tesla filling stations, they are actually go to designations with access to gyms, cafes and other facilities included for Tesla owners.
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    I have also often wondered if it would be better to re-invent  motorail and keep cars on the move while charging them from the 25kV train overheads. 

    That would be an excellent idea and extend the potential travelling distance of many electric cars! 


    I've always thought how great it would be if Eurotunnel's vehicle trains could extend their journey and travel through the whole of Europe rather than kicking you out at Calais and then you having to do the potentially very long drive to your destination. ?
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    I am not at all sure that we need EV stations in the same way as we need filling stations. The crucial difference is that whereas most of us can plug in at home, there is no network of petrol pipes, nobody delivers it, and it cannot be stored in large quantities (other than in a vehicle).


    Granted, EV stations will be needed for long journeys and possibly in places where people can pass through. They may also be needed where on-street parking is the only option. This probably explains why the local Instavolt chargers barely get used. They are in the middle of a suburb on a peninsula where most properties have drives or parking spaces.
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    Why move all those lumps of metal on the train? Just move the people and have a car share system at the stations like this


    Well that is good too, but you have to include provision also for  folk with  luggage, prams, shopping etc. My vehicle  is also a mobile toolbox, which I'd hate to decant more often than necessary


    Also you have to allow for the subtle paradigm shift between a Swiss railway and a UK one.

    The first it a means of transport the second is a profit making  real estate company with long thin assets, and a secondary business renting vehicle storage services to train companies.



    Personally for sanity  think we should be moving away from apartments,  at least as apartments are round here are done,  which seems to be to chop up solid wall Victorian buildings into 30m2 units with randomly placed partitions silly shaped rooms,  poor sound proofing and and no greenspace or parking outside, and to ask £600- £800 /month for it. Then folk wonder why there are bikes on the landing and the fire doors never get shut. It is no-ones job to provide a bike shed...


    For those who have discovered working from home involves being perched on the end of a mattress with their feet against the cupboard under the sink it  is not much fun, and no way at all to educate youngsters. Personally I have a semi-det house and some garden, but I do see what other folk are doing and it's not great.

    M.

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    Indeed, most of the problems are structural ones. If you had good quality apartments, 80-100m2 with good sound and thermal insulation, their own green spaces, bike stores, cellar space etc that would be much more acceptable. Can/will the UK do that' no :-(


    Travel is also a different concept. If you think flying and then move to a (European) train it is much easier. When I was a service engineer with Europe as my patch you had to think what you really needed to take with you. In the UK when I could use a car it was easier, but even then Glasgow was considered to be  a flight rather than a drive (from Swindon).
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    I drove down to Vent Axia to do a training course, however two guys from Aberdeen flew down and walked the last three miles from Gatwick.
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    Continuing the thread drift ...


    Some years ago, I went to Spiez in Switzerland by train. Because it was business, I was driven to the station. Then it was up to Waterloo and change platforms for the Eurostar. RER around Paris and TGV to Lausanne. Express to Bern and stopping train for the last bit. First class where available 'cos it was business. I sneaked in a weekend in Paris with Mrs P (at my own expense) on the way back. It was all rather enjoyable.


    I don't think that there was a huge difference between the trains, but the Eurostar (after the first bit) didn't half shift, as did the TGV. Lunch was something cooked in an oven on the TGV. 


    I wouldn't have wanted to drive all the way (700-odd miles), be it in a liquid-fuelled car or an electric one!


    By far the worst bit, is getting to the station locally. It is only about 4 miles away, but the bus takes about an hour! That precludes any notion of commuting by public transport.
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    A 100m2 apartment is probably more floor area than the average terraced house in the UK,  ref..at least as built and  ignoring any 'sunlounge' or conservatory that is planted in the garden.

    It's also asking to be partitioned into smaller flats.....

    M.
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    mapj1:

    A 100m2 apartment is probably more floor area than the average terraced house in the UK,  ref..at least as built and  ignoring any 'sunlounge' or conservatory that is planted in the garden.


    The most recent local development allows, IIRC, 25 m² per adult.


    Gone are the days when a professional gentleman (or even a successful one in trade) needed 10 times as much, partly to accommodate their half-dozen domestic servants!


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    Chris Pearson:

    I am not at all sure that we need EV stations in the same way as we need filling stations. The crucial difference is that whereas most of us can plug in at home, there is no network of petrol pipes, nobody delivers it, and it cannot be stored in large quantities (other than in a vehicle).


    Granted, EV stations will be needed for long journeys and possibly in places where people can pass through. They may also be needed where on-street parking is the only option. This probably explains why the local Instavolt chargers barely get used. They are in the middle of a suburb on a peninsula where most properties have drives or parking spaces.


    One reason I can think of for maintaining them as charging stations is power distribution. I can't see how the LV network round here will be able to cope with everyone switching to electric cars (though daily charging and diversity would help).

    It might make more sense financially to install a new feed (not at LV, ideally) to a charging station and use battery storage to allow fast chargers to be used in excess of the supply capacity (so, very short charge times for 80% capacity). Some of the Tesla charging stations in the US are already doing something similar to this.


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