Good morning grid connections listeners.
Welcome to the fourth season of grid connections.
And today we have Steve Birkett the founder of plug and play EV returning
along with Walter Schulze joining us for the first time.
Walter is the host of the network architect channel where he hosts the EV
driver series.
He shares timely updates on EV charging station providers and new locations that
are adding across the country.
Together we'll all delve into some of the latest perceptions around EV sales
numbers.
and explore maybe it's not all doom and gloom as the headlines would want you to
believe.
Then explore the challenges dealerships face in selling electric vehicles and
examine the ongoing rollout of EV charging infrastructure across the country.
Plus, we'll also discuss some of the tactics charge point operators use when
discussing an EV fast charging location to meet various use cases.
Being based in a more rural part of the West Coast, I really appreciate Stephen
Walter for sharing their own recent experiences with driving their electric
vehicles on the East Coast.
and some of the road trips into the Midwest they've taken.
It's always fascinating to hear how the EV landscape varies across different regions.
It seems like out of the three of us, I've had the most issues lately, but we all
agree that overall it continues to be an overly positive and improving experience
for all of us.
As a reminder, if you enjoy this episode, please share it with at least one friend
or colleague who would find it interesting as well.
Don't forget to leave a positive review on our podcast page.
Your support helps us reach more listeners and continue bringing you great content.
With that, enjoy.
Walter, do you want to kick it off?
Certainly my name is Walter Schulze, the owner and operator of the Network
Architect Channel Studios, which is basically just my home office, really
nothing much to it.
I'm a technologist by profession for multiple decades and have become an EV
enthusiast over the past several years and have been pursuing YouTube content
creation probably for 18 months or so and find a way of...
Pursuing an outlet for my passion for EVs is a lot of fun to engage with the social
media community out there.
I'm Steve Birkett.
I'm a plug and play EV on YouTube.
I've been doing it since around 2018, 2019.
Years seemed to fly by, but started off in a bolt EV back then and it was much
different landscape than it is now.
Started thinking we've talked about it chase a little bit on the previous
episode, just covering some of the content, cold weather charging, the very
early stages of DC fast charging and kind of grew from there.
So eventually hooked up with a guy called Eric Way out on the West Coast in
who's even older OG Bolt owner than myself and Walter joined us as well for what we
now have as a fortnightly podcast on EV charging and electric vehicle
infrastructure called Coast to Coast EVs.
So that's about where we are today.
Yeah.
I just want to say thank you both for being on.
I know Eric couldn't make it today, but we're helping to have him on a future
episode as well.
And definitely recommend anyone who loves our content on grid connections.
I think, the show that you guys do perfectly aligns with kind of a lot of the
similar topics and really appreciate just kind of getting some of the context and
some of the, definitely, I don't want to say microcosms, but definitely some of the
other areas that you guys really do focus on that.
personally, I just don't think get enough attention.
So I've always been a big fan of the show.
but with that, I know one of the things that we kind of wanted to probably kick it
off with is just, I think there's, it's really been the theme probably for the
last six months, maybe even more, news around kind of a pullback in the EV space
and EV charging.
And I think, some of that's finally starting to change where people are
realizing that it's more media headlines and hype than reality.
Maybe if anything short -term struggles for a few players in the space, but
everything is still kind of going in the right direction.
So with that, I would kind of just love to kind of kick that off and just get your
own thoughts about any areas that either of you are seeing, maybe, maybe some
slowdown, but the areas that you still remain optimistic for growth and electric
vehicles in the space overall.
Nobody really told folks in my area that there was a slowdown because I see more
and more diverse range of EVs every day.
Even Walter drives a Cadillac Lyric, as I'm sure I'll get onto.
I'm seeing a lot more of those nowadays.
So there's just the diversity locally.
I'm just here north of Boston in Massachusetts.
So obviously have that, you know, coastal, slightly friendly EV state perhaps than
some of the others where people will focus the negativity.
But I think if you look at the numbers and...
the general trends, although you can always pick out some individual month to
month or year to year stats that kind of show an issue, not least, you know, Tesla
at the moment at the start of the year in Q1 is the one that's kind of down a little
bit, but then you look to your Ford and Ikea, even GM kind of potentially coming
up with some of their new models.
It really, it starts to put the light to that kind of EV sales are a lot of people
try to make out dropping, but really it's kind of a slowdown in growth, which is
kind of natural when you consider you're going from that early adopter
where nobody had an EV to that kind of slightly more mature market where the
growth is inevitably going to slow but it isn't cratering, it's not stopping, this
is just kind of another little blip on the way to wider EV adoption.
Yeah, I think that sums it up pretty well.
I don't know if there was anything else Walter you wanted to add to that or any
other things that maybe you've seen.
My personal opinion is we have the economics.
On our side, fleet owners are adopting electric vehicles not because they're
trying to save the planet, they're trying to improve their balance sheets.
And when economics makes sense, there's the phrase, no army can withstand the
force of an idea whose time has come.
And I think it's becoming clearer and clearer that the economics around EVs just
makes sense for fleet owners and also household budgets.
And when
that's the case when you can improve the quality of life and also decrease the
expenditures for cost for transportation in the same swoop.
It's very difficult to say that there's going to be a decrease in sales.
In fact, I don't know anyone who has a forecast for EV sales that is predicting a
downturn.
There's two notable ones, Bloomberg and Coxville Automotive just in the past, I
think, month have both forecasted increased growth for EVs.
And they're either one of those are environmentally centric outlets.
They're very pragmatic.
Just today I was watching the Autoline Daily and there was a report about Toyota,
which makes arguably the worst EV in the market.
And there's some question if they're trying to torpedo their own.
initiatives or whatever but the BZ -4X, the RZ Lexus and the Subaru Soltera
combined year -to -date are 17 ,000 units and for the producer of perhaps the worst
EV those are pretty solid numbers you know back five years ago 17 ,000 units year -to
-date to June 1st would have been something to celebrate and now these are
just kind of like meh numbers.
So I think the demand is there and as I said fleet owners are proceeding as if
this whole
of lack of ED demand doesn't exist.
Ride share owner operators are very heavy into EVs and so I think when the economics
make sense there's really no stopping it.
Yeah, I think you just brought up a lot of great points on that one kind of
conversation right there, Walter.
w what's really fascinating is you, you quoted, not just Bloomberg, but also Cox
automotive.
And, I actually used to do some work with auto line daily.
And one of the things we used to talk with are some of the people there at, both Cox
and, Bloomberg.
And what was so funny was you just wind the clock back maybe two or let alone like
three years ago.
And the numbers that they had for EV growth was like super, I guess you could
just say pessimistic.
And it seems like every quarter, a lot of these groups, even with maybe they've
changed it a little bit, but it's like every year.
And then you look at it quarterly, that number that they're predicting the future
growth to be has actually increased.
It's like, you go back a few years, like, we see this maybe being 20%.
And now you go like two years back and like, well, maybe we see it being 30%.
Like, well, yeah, probably by 2030, it's going to be 40%.
And so there's kind of this, bizarre, hindsight is 2020 obviously, but it is
just really interesting to show that, a lot of the people that I think have kind
of pushed back on the narrative and said that there isn't a need, even the more
conservative outlier, can outlets out there or have been slowly revamping their
long -term numbers in a positive direction.
And even though sometimes we'll be seeing the headlines from them, like, does this
quarter sales mean that this trend is reversing?
It really is all around the idea that the short -term noise doesn't really align
with what we're seeing as kind of, excuse me, as a long -term signal, in the space
between buyers and, interest in electric vehicles.
You're going to add something Walter.
a single prediction out there indicating a decrease in EV growth that I know of.
There might be one out there, but I have not seen it.
And I try to be objective in the outlets that I review, but it's going to increase.
The only question is at what measure.
And that's really the art.
No, and I think that's a great clarifying point because for a lot of them, I think
what we have seen is.
And this is I've seen misreported where maybe some of these outlets have revised
what they think their growth number is going to be a year over year.
So maybe they were saying it was going to be 45 % and then they say 40 % and it's
still growth, but then it gets misreported as, it looks like you've, these are losing
momentum and stuff like that.
And even then I've already seen between, like January.
a similar thing.
I I'm trying to remember the outlet, but they said, it's going to go down to 30%.
And they had been, previously saying it was going to be 40 to 50 % growth.
And now they're back up to like 40%.
And I think, there's just so much, just these kind of short -term blips that keep
popping up the news, whether it's some of the, I guess I could say fear -mongering,
winter charging and the experience that we're seeing, even in Chicago and a couple
areas this past winter.
And that just kind of gets all the noise.
And then people try to put that in these models based on short -term data and
really start throwing off these numbers.
But I completely agree with you, Walter, when you start looking at it longer term
and actually going to usually the actual new source and people doing these reports,
the numbers are pretty convincing that what has started is just going to
continue.
Worth remembering as well that these are numbers that are without some of the major
players, right?
So, you know, Walter mentioned Toyota in their kind of lackluster approach to EVs.
You've got, you know, GM, which has only really been in with the Bolt EV, which
obviously left, but, you know, is coming back with a bunch of others that are at
that affordable stage of the market.
You've got Honda coming in with the Prologue.
A lot of Stellantis brands, you know, you could list off another 10, 5, 10
manufacturers that haven't really been in the game yet.
So even just by introducing them and adding...
10, 20, 30 ,000.
units to the the cells then you start to rack up even if we just kind of sell the
same number of the previous the Tesla or even a few a few less then you start to
get all these other manufacturers piling in and the numbers are just going to go up
and up by virtue of loyalists people who treat the vehicle like an appliance
because it's a to be soccer run groceries that kind of thing they just need
something to get from you know one place to another and those models do the job for
them so while we as EV purists might say peak charging is awful takes an
hour to go from zero to 50%, whatever it is.
They don't care.
They're probably not gonna fast charge it.
It's for the grocery run, it's for local duty, all these kinds of things that we
take for daily use just for granted.
And EV does the job.
So there's a big, big soft middle there to just pile into and sell vehicles to people
who aren't on one end or the other of the spectrum.
They're just there waiting for it to be the right price.
the right range, whatever it takes for their use case, they're not pro or anti
-EV, they just need it to be the right vehicle or the right manufacturer.
I think that's a great point too.
And one of the things that I don't think has been fully appreciated.
I think a lot of the conversation does kind of go around the early adopter
mentality, but with exactly what you're saying, not only just more options from
different brands, but more options at more price points.
There's a lot of families that I've probably been interested or just haven't
had EVs on their radar because it just hasn't been in their price point.
But I think everyone thinks about the early adopter.
And with so many people, really what is a big starting point is replacing the second
car they have.
If they can replace that second car with an around town EV and they start driving
that, they kind of start to realize a lot of the perks and realize how useful that
that can be for their primary car.
And so maybe when they go to replace that next time, and then that's where you kind
of see that snowball effect in the growth.
So, I completely agree with you.
I think having more people come to the space with more EVs is really just going
to accelerate what we're already seeing.
And, the biggest thing has always just been like, once one person gets one on the
block, then other people start telling, okay, if Joe can do it, then maybe these
things are practical.
And once again, it's just like, you have to have that daily exposure.
And I would kind of be curious for both of you guys, what do you think, is there a
way that traditional auto OEMs could be doing a better job of getting that
exposure?
Because I really do think it is that, that it, there is that element of just kind of,
as they say, getting,
butts and seats and doing test drives and maybe not even a test drive, but almost a
extended test drive where you have it for a few days to a week.
Because I will say I did have a, I don't want to name any names, but I had a very
subpar experience from a traditional OEM dealership recently.
The salespeople were great, but the interest, clearly their own personal
interest in EVs, let alone knowledge base of it.
just made it clear that they wanted to sell the other version that wasn't an EV.
And I'm kind of curious if there's been any exposure or experiences you guys have
had that kind of helped maybe counteract that or things that you think auto OEM
should be doing more to change that perception buying experience for the
average consumer.
I think the experience in general is twofold.
It obviously requires the salesperson and the dealership to have some interest in
selling them in the first place.
I mean, they may get an allocation, but if they're not charged, they're sitting
around the back of the lot, nobody knows how to get in the vehicle and show you the
ins and outs of things like regenerative braking, let you know the accelerator is
going to push you forward pretty quickly.
That kind of the ins and outs of electric vehicles,
that need to be something that they start to at least put on the table rather than
immediately starting with, you know, the charging issues, the things that you can't
do with it.
So the dealership attitude is certainly something right from the off.
And then I think there's some of the more forward thinking OEMs are starting to
experiment with rentals, you know, short term rentals at certain dealership or
shorter leases, low mileage leases for exactly that kind of user that you're
talking about, the one with the second car who maybe doesn't need to worry about it
for the long.
that kind of thing.
So it's a way of getting, you know, as we always say, these ride and drive events,
bumps and seeds, get them experiencing it in a very low risk, low kind of commitment
way.
So the,
They can get into the feeling of an EV, how easy it is potentially to plug in at
home, to do their weekly mileage with an electric drivetrain, but still have the
knowledge that they can get out of the lease if they want to.
They just need to get over that hump initially of, will it work for me, as you
say, and if you can start to give them options that are very short, low mileage,
not too high cost, and affordable models that suit their needs.
I think you're already halfway there.
Yeah, and I would like to add the advantage that we're facing in 2024 for
what you're describing.
And I'm kind of curious, Chase, where do you, like, where did you have that
experience?
What part of the country?
West a small city along I5 on the west coast.
I'll leave it at that.
Yeah
strange.
You would have thought that you'd be the option would have been high enough there
that the interest would have been different.
I just perceived it differently out there.
it is definitely a smaller, very beautiful, more rural city, but I think it
was, I don't want to say eye opening or surprising, but it was really interesting
to hear and see the, the actual sales experience and positioning of the EV.
and I mean, they first just came out like, well, why would you get it?
Can't tell anything.
And, I, one, I didn't really try to push back.
I just wanted to see what they kind of came at me with and what, what they
started saying.
and it just was really interesting where they started with.
And like when I even started to push back, they're just like, why don't you just get
the gas version?
And it, I don't know.
I'm, still cautiously optimistic, but I do think that that is a big challenge.
even if you're still seeing that from dealerships, I don't know if this, I know
some of these, OEMs are.
trying to make certain dealerships more EV focused or EV partners, if you will, with
their brand than others.
And I'm not sure if this one was one, probably not for multiple reasons, but
even then I would say the sales experience compared to some of the other dealerships
I experienced as I've had in the past was overall positive.
The person was nice.
They weren't too pushy, but it was just clear that they had no interest in the EV
side of stuff.
And it was unfortunate to kind of be reminded of this.
and it's kind of the first time I'd seen this in a while.
once again, maybe it is the outlier, but, it just was one of those things that I
think still a pretty big challenge.
And if we're seeing this on the West coast and I think it's going to be just
something nationally that, and I think obviously, from a country standpoint,
we're probably.
looking at, like you look at Europe and abroad, I don't think it's nearly as big
an issue.
And I think some of that may be the truck culture and other things, but, it was just
really fascinating to me that they just had no interest in it pretty quickly or
like, yeah, it's a cool toy.
and they were trying to reposition the conversation pretty quickly to a different
product.
That is interesting.
I went on a road trip into coal country, which is Eastern Kentucky and West
Virginia.
And I did stop at a dealership because it's one of the few places that had a
level two charger anywhere.
There's like no chargers whatsoever.
And so I tried to use it, but it was broken.
I went in and I was talking to them and it was obvious there was a palatable light,
you know, please take your EV and go somewhere else mentality.
But that's coal country, which is a little bit different.
I would have thought in the West Coast.
But in 2024, one thing we have going for us is as
A salesperson is walking a floor knowing they've got the $7 ,500 tax credit in
their pocket where they could show someone a sticker price, let them sit in the car,
and then hit them with a $7 ,500 discount is a pretty powerful sales tool in the
tool chest.
And I would think, you know, just for pure sick.
I don't think it is.
I think they look at it as, or at least this is my experience.
And I've kind of wondered if this would be the case.
they look at it as just one more hurdle to try and kind of have the conversation
like, okay, now I have to talk to about charging now have to talk about even
incentives if they qualify or if they do leasing or all this stuff.
To me, it just became clear, like, this is just making the sales process more
complicated, good or bad.
you're that way.
totally agree with what you're saying, Walter.
It should be looked at as actually, an advantage, but it was just really
interesting experience.
and I was looking at the sticker.
I'm like, all right, here's how the script is going to go.
They'll sit down, they'll look at the sticker, they'll sit down and then I'll
say, well, you get $70 ,000 and then go to paperwork.
It'd be something that you have in the EV that you don't have in the other cars.
I think it's worth contrasting as well with, you know, there is not a small
gorilla in the room with Tesla's method of delivery and looking at direct sales.
Obviously that's limited in some places.
They are headquartered in Texas, but can't even sell that directly, you know, but
there are more and more of these coming up with your Lucid, Rivian, Polestar even.
If you start to go to some of these spaces, I think you feel it's a different
environment in which to consider an electric vehicle.
to some extent with the dealerships you're at the mercy of exactly what you say
Chase, it's the individual in charge or the salesperson who's managing the team
interested in electric vehicles.
If they are, you get some very, very good dealerships.
There are some great places who have really tried to make initiatives with
charging parks, cafes were next to the charges that they serve during the day, EV
own the events, a lot of different initiatives that just fall under the
bucket of marketing the vehicles.
But if you're
If you find a dealership that is of the mindset they're being forced to sell these
things, I think that's where it switches into exactly what you're talking about.
The incentive is just another piece of paperwork to do.
They have to explain a different form of fuelling.
It's more work than it's worth.
But they've got the sword of Damocles hanging over them that is, if that starts
to really get close, then they have direct sales, EVO only makers, and a lot of other
competitive threats that it would be better to start at least
for and figure out how to sell these things now before it's critical time.
Otherwise, further down the line, it's going to be a long, big hill to climb to
get back to just even status quo.
For sure.
And there definitely are some other charging topics I want to talk to you guys
about, but, just, it kind of reminded me of this recent experience.
And, I, I was surprised by, I kind of figured it would come up, but I didn't
expect it to come up so quickly.
And, with multiple salespeople, they were just like, they were, they were all
actually really nice.
but they're just like, why would you waste your time with those things?
Those are toys.
Let's, and then they showed the other trucks and all this other.
vehicles they have.
And when I asked him about the discount, they're like, well, that one doesn't
count.
And this one does.
And it's so hard to keep track of which one qualifies for what, which I kind of
also get, but, isn't doing many favors and moving EVs.
And the thing I wanted to ask you to see is cause you have the ionic five right
now.
You look at Hyundai and Kia, they are brands that were growing, but seem to have
really taken a large.
a spike in growth with their electric vehicle, approach in product and sales.
And so I kind of am curious with your experience, was it much more, they were
more open to it because they, you really weren't competing against another vehicle
that they offer.
Whereas I think in my experience, they're like, well, we got the diesel version, we
got the gas version and that electric thing, who knows, whatever.
And I feel like that almost was kind of causing some internal confusion and like,
combativeness against the models versus maybe I just be a little real quickly here
your experience of it was much more different or much different.
It would have been perhaps interesting if I was shopping the Kona because that has a
direct, you know, plug -in hybrid and a...
pure gas version, but shopping the IONIQ 5.
I think Hyundai corporately and Kia as well have put a big push behind them to
let people, the dealerships know that they want to sell these and they've created
products that are mostly unique.
I haven't noticed any particularly positive dealership stories with Hyundai
or Kia to be honest, more so with Hyundai on the ownership boards, but they
generally seem to be the weakest link of the sales process, but they haven't also
had very many horrors to
than the initial markups and what you get with every EV pretty much when it's in
limited supply.
But I haven't seen the dealerships as either a big plus in trying to sell them
or an impediment in trying to steer me away to anything else.
Yeah.
And Walter, I know, with your experience, was it mostly when you were, you kind of
ordered it, reserved it online, and then essentially took delivery of it at the
dealership or did you have more, engagement with taking delivery of your
car at the dealership?
of those, no.
Really my wife and my household makes most of the purchasing decisions for large
ticket items like that and she wanted a Tesla Model 3.
She got herself one.
I was driving it around for a while and slowly I started to be like, well what's
this electric car thing like?
You know, we had the charger installed in the garage and she was enjoying it.
You know, it looked like a nice car.
You know, you hear about Teslas, it's like a sexy new toy as you say.
And ooh, I want to try, you know, put on my Ray -Bans and go cruise around in the
Tesla.
Slowly though, I started to realize this thing don't break down.
It has no oil changes and it's more reliable.
We got a nice tax break.
This was 2019, I forgot what the tax code was back then, but we got a nice tax
break.
We had to change the tires once and fill it with windshield washer fluid, but that
was about it.
After that, the next car we added, we put in a Volvo XC40 Recharge, which is kind
like a...
crossover SUV, I think is a way of describing it, a little mid -size SUV.
And so we had the Model 3 and the Volvo XC40 Recharge, as well as a Hyundai Ioniq,
not an Ioniq 5, just the hybrid Ioniq, which was what my son was using prior to
going to college.
We sold that and we also got a Cadillac Lyric trading in the Tesla Model 3.
The Model 3 is kind of a low car.
I don't know if anyone's been in it and driven it as a daily driver.
It's kind of a low car.
Me and my wife are both in our 50s.
So we're like, eh, so when you sit in a Cadillac, it's a super comfortable cream
puff.
So we traded in three for a Lyric and got a, again, a big tax discount.
And it wasn't horribly expensive.
It wasn't like a Tesla Model X, but it's in the same sort of class, I would say, as
a Model X.
It's kind of a luxury large SUV, not a three row SUV, but it's a large SUV.
And...
Again, no breakdowns.
You don't do anything to them.
It's like a dream come true.
It's like the most reliable Mercedes from the 90s on steroids.
That's just ridiculously reliable.
You can charge it in your garage.
I don't go to gas stations anymore.
And really that was what has been the evolution for me, being utterly convinced
that not only is it...
Beneficial personally, from a national standpoint, sourcing the fuel for the
transportation from domestically produced energy is strategically in the best
interest of the country.
I think that's one of the reasons why China is so ferociously starting to adopt
EVs and encouraging them just because they could be energy independent.
interesting you mentioned that trip to coal country because if anything you know
the generating electricity from coal could actually you know save some of these areas
because you could actually have a coal powered EV at that point but that is a
meme and a trope that is pretty much dying out as far as coal production goes now.
Yeah, my house is nuclear.
I don't know if that's good or bad, but it is what it is.
yeah, being on the West coast, we have a lot of hydro and that has its own pros and
cons.
Yeah, that's kind of interesting.
You talk about your trip through cool country because I've drawn, I drive
through, I've done a lot of road trips through Wyoming and, there it's kind of
the same deal where large coal mines and, the actual coal facilities.
And there's definitely, I don't know.
I w I was kind of surprised.
how they didn't really cast off EVs in my experience with meeting people there.
I didn't go to any of the dealerships, maybe that'd be different, but it
definitely did seem to be kind of more of an openness and interest in it than I had
been expecting.
I think that's almost why I was so surprised of my recent dealership
experience.
Not being like negative per se, but not just being open to like, okay, this is a
buyer that's interested in it.
Why don't I just move forward and make this happen instead of trying to go down a
different path.
But.
with that, one of the, let's, let's change topics a little bit.
I guess go to the actual charging side of stuff.
And I know, it's, it was really interesting on our last conversation
talking with you guys about your experience with kind of DC fast charging
on the East coast versus kind of what being really in the center of Oregon.
So kind of in a pretty rural area, just the, evolution and the addition of EV
public EV chargers.
There was a large announcement.
I know it seems like you've been following it pretty closely, Walter and Steve about
kind of flying Jay and some of the stuff with, GM and their, I believe, EV go kind
of have like a partnership for rolling out.
And it seems like they've kind of cut that back from everything I can see here in
Oregon, unfortunately.
but I, I'm just kind of curious if you guys have seen any new developments or,
and I know kind of the other big thing that happened a few months ago or.
Probably not even that long a couple of months ago was the big kind of
announcements from Tesla kind of pulling back on their charging team a bit, but
kind of just curious to hear regionally what your experience has been lately.
just cause I had to use a public charger the other day and, it's a CPO I've,
charging provider that I consistently have been underwhelmed with.
And I just, fortunately I didn't need a charge.
but I decided, you know what, this is a pretty.
Heavily invested one.
this it's not, I actually have no problem saying it's EVCS and it's essentially part
of the West coast electric highway program.
So they put a bunch of them all up and down Oregon, California and Washington.
And it was a terrible experience.
I'll leave it at that.
but I, I just be curious.
It seems like you guys have been seeing a lot more kind of development with the
public fast charters on the East coast and kind of Midwest area and just continued
growth.
And I don't know if it.
Seems to be like it's coming east to west with some of these projects, but I just be
curious to hear what experience you guys have been having with just your own
personal charging and then other maybe just stories of note in the space that I
think we could share with our listeners.
I think I...
I have a lot of experience with Electrify America and some of the early programs, so
EVGO and the CCS networks that proliferated and Walter has definitely
stepped in with a lot of coverage from the kind of ground zero of your, as you say,
Pilot Flying Jays, your Buc -E's and Mercedes, Fast Charging, Walmart getting
into it.
So I can set a stage perhaps for where we've come from and how it started.
And I think Walter is just the king of weekly.
on all of these new networks that are expanding out of his area and into yours,
Chase to an extent, certainly into mine.
But going back to the initial kind of areas with Electrify America, which
started up in my area, Central Massachusetts around 2018, they obviously
carried the can in the last year or two for the poster child of public.
charging unreliability, not being able to get a charge, half of the site being down,
that kind of thing.
I think it was fair to an extent that you could certainly say a lot of their older
equipment had problems.
They've acknowledged that themselves and the West Coast seems to have been a
particular pain point.
Growing out in the last year, 18 months maybe now, they've upgraded to the latest
generation hardware with mostly BTC power and signet stations, which are kind of
visible via this black siding and cladding and then a diagonal top, but most notably
they only have one port.
I've found personally, and having been kind of gravitate towards them because I
have a free charging plan that ends in about six months time with the IONIQ 5
that kind of keeps me on Electrify America to an extent.
They've been much better in the last, certainly since they ripped and replaced a
lot of those locations.
They've been, I really haven't had any problems.
I can't remember the last time I could not charge with Electrify America.
EBGO has been kind of hampered to an extent with these older sites.
They've had the same issue of older hardware that they put in perhaps even
before 2018, a lot of 50 kilowatt, 100 kilowatts.
So by today's standards, you know, if you're looking at 200, 300 kilowatt
charging, they are antiquated units that have been in the ground for...
almost a decade now, so a lot of those, they're having the same kind of thing,
although not on such a nationwide scale as Electrify America.
So they have improved as well.
You've got a lot of the NEVI funding, which maybe we'll get onto as a national
federally funded program, is using these combination EVGO and Pilot Flying J
locations, which have 350 kilowatt hardware, you know, pretty much rock solid
as far as I've seen, maybe one outage in six to nine months of the NEVI program
being around.
But it's a
those two players that kind of formed it, you know, and actually are a viable
nationwide network perhaps, are probably the most, you know, long -standing
standard bearers and they both seem to be getting their act together compared to
maybe two years ago when everything was getting, you know, negative headlines, but
that kind of bleeds into...
The East Coast has certainly been positive for me.
I do a lot of trips over to Ohio, so Midwest connecting Northeast has always
been fairly good for me, but Walter is seeing that kind of, those new networks
branch out of his area and can speak pretty authoritatively to what's coming
and how far they've got so far.
.
Yeah, and I could kind of venture off, but I'm going to try to stay focused on the
question that was asked.
But the one that I've seen recently, like just today, was VW Dieselgate funds
disbursement for state run locations.
There's a lot of blank spots in the map that are getting filled in, at least in
the state of North Carolina for that.
Just recently, two new stations opened in kind of an underserved area.
And so those funds are still getting dispersed.
So there's Dieselgate funds getting dispersed.
There's
the large pool of NEBI funds getting ready to be dispersed.
And I'm sorry, not to cut you off.
When you say diesel gate funds, it's not necessarily that they're electrify America
sites, but they are sites.
Yeah.
Just to clarify for a list.
Yeah.
disbursements for local independent CPOs getting built and lots of times those will
be CPE 250s that have wrapping on them indicating that there was a joint
partnership with the state or whatever and those are very common in my area and
there's been additional building of those in underserved areas along alternative
fuel corridors through the state of North Carolina as of late.
So that's still going on.
But really the big
is the C -Store space, the convenience store space, where as a C -Store operator,
if you look to see that you could have a higher dwell time of your customers, and
you could also have your fuel delivered near the theoretical speed of light and
not have to have liquid form trucked into a store in tanks, it just makes business
sense to sink a little more upfront costs into electric vehicle charging
infrastructure and then let your customers decide if they're going to use them or
not.
And I think there's a lot of
store operators experimenting with that concept.
You mentioned Pilot Flying J.
Not slow down.
I don't know.
So you mentioned slow down.
That's not what I'm seeing.
In fact, I just saw another new site today.
I'm up to 41 sites that are now under construction with 38 sites open.
And their goal is 200 by the end of the year.
And I'm starting to think they might make it.
So if they finish what they have now on their plate, they'll be up to 80.
And every day I turn around, there's additional sites getting spotted as under.
so that's definitely in full swing and as you mentioned is the joint partnership
between General Motors, Pilot Flying J which is at Berkshire Hathaway Company, as
well as EVgo so it's a triple partnership.
But really it's the C stores, the Circle K's, the 7 -Elevens, the Quick Trips, the
BP's, the Shell's stations, all those locations that are looking at advantageous
customer dwell times and the ease of delivering the fuel to the vehicles, in my
opinion is the big sea change that I'm seeing.
There's another one regional out here called Racetrack.
Them as well are, they just open multiple locations throughout the Dallas -Fort
Worth area.
area and the build continues.
That's crazy.
I'm kind of curious where you go to for information, new location specifically
with it.
Cause the reason I bring up, the ones in Oregon was just two weeks ago, I had
looked on the map that had showed where there were potential ones and where there
were going to be ones in Oregon.
And now they're showing is all potential.
And I understood that.
And I've kind of checked you in on a couple other places that it's maybe not
happening or it's like still like it's being pushed out.
And so I'm, I'm just kind of curious.
Where you usually go to find kind of confirmation like, cause I'm using the map
that's based.
I believe that was GM site.
It could have been pilots.
and now they're showing them as optional or like potential ones versus it was going
to be mostly potential, like a few for sure.
And now it's just showing like maybe.
Yeah, so if it was,
kind of dark gray with purple pin drops.
That's the Pilot Flying J map.
And that is updated, reflecting ones that are expected to be in service by the end
of 24.
And the count is 200.
Their goal is 500 in total.
So it's kind of on track.
It depends on which map you look at.
Some maps show like kind of like the proposed phase one, but the one map that I
think you're referring to is the end of 2024 map off the Pilot Flying J website.
And there's 200 in there.
And as you say, it's proposed location.
So there's some variability in whether or not those are actually going to occur.
that maybe it's moved back because they might not there still might move forward
with them just not in 2024.
Because the one I'd seen earlier in the year showed that there was gonna be like
three and now it's like proposed and I'd love to see more.
So that that that's good.
Yeah.
41 that I'm currently tracking under construction and every day there's new
ones popping up.
So they're spending cash.
there any States or kind of hubs or areas that you're seeing them take off more than
others, or are you seeing kind of it?
Like I said, when I looked at the map last, it looked like it was almost going
east to west.
And I'm just kind of curious.
There might've been like some in California, like Southern California, like
in Seattle.
but I'm just kind of curious if you're seeing pockets or stern States where
they're really being built first.
There's a little bit of tea leaf reading, but from what I'm gathering, they seem to
be watching who is announcing NEBI funds.
And when a state announces, they either pause to receive the NEBI funds or if they
weren't awarded any, they proceed with their private bill.
So they're kind of like waiting, staggering up, waiting for those NEBI
funds to be released.
And in the state of Ohio, they had many round one awards and they they're built.
They are under construction and almost done.
So basically they're track.
They seem to be tracking NEBI announcements.
That's great.
Yeah, I know you had some thoughts you wanted to share on the Nevi funding side
of stuff, Steve, and just seeing how that's been rolled out.
I know on LinkedIn, I've seen a couple of your posts around both good and bad with
your thoughts on that.
So I think that'd be great to share here.
Yeah, I mean, I think if anybody wants the actual numbers and you know who's awarded
what and which states are leading or which CPOs are leading, Lauren MacDonald at EV
adoption is the place to go.
He's got the policy side down and who's winning what.
So there's always good rankings coming from that.
I think, you know, most notably is kind of as Walter pointed out, you know, I've,
I've focused on the construction side and then the reliability of stations, which
are in the ground, which is easy at the moment because there are only eight of
them.
So it's pretty easy to track, but as Walter kind of hinted there, you know,
there's a, I think Pilot Flying J and EVGO in that partnership won about 20, 22,
something like that.
Stations in the round one funding and about half of those now are, one of them
is open, but about, you know,
are about to come online.
So we're really going to start to get this tsunami of activations in the states that
led the way with wards.
But that's kind of the next wave of activations because you're seeing, as
Walter mentioned, a lot of chains like the Loves, the Travel Centers of America.
I lose track of the number of names, but a lot of these are applying and because
they're supposed to be travel networks and they're supposed to be within one mile of
an interstate, you really winnow down pretty quickly what's within that one mile
of an interstate exit, right?
There's travel, you know, truck stops, travel centers, maybe surface plazas and
the occasional mom and pop store.
But for the most part, this is these big national chains that are starting to open
these things.
So we're seeing a lot of the activations happen here in the Northeast, which has
helped me keep track
of it you know I was able to go up to the Tesla, the first Tesla federally funded
site in Maine which is in a really strange little area kind of not really near an
interstate but off on the way to Acadia National Park.
So you're seeing some kind of leading tech almost you know because it's the first
Tesla V4 post that has a touchscreen on it first that you can activate with a card
whereas previously you'd have just plug in and you know because that's Tesla's closed
ecosystem you know working in lockstep but now they've got all these new
requirements.
So you're starting to see the money flow to your Teslas, your Pilot Flying Jays,
and one of the biggest names that I don't really have a lot of kind of experience
with because they're in Midwest, kind of Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, that kind of
area provider is Francis Energy, who I think just became the leading number of
awards, at least certainly they won the most funding from the National Electric
Vehicle Infrastructure funding.
And that's going to be really interesting because I don't hear great things about
that.
to be honest.
Our viewers on the Coast to Coast TV's podcast have, you know, maybe it's using
old equipment, old kind of dated references, but they have a lot of skin in
the game for this Nefi funding and they are now kind of leading even beyond Tesla
and you kind of hinted at the layoffs at Tesla.
If they're going to take up the mantle, they're going to have a lot of pressure on
their shoulders to really deliver for the number of sites and the amount of money
that they're taking in.
Yeah, I think that's kind of a good thing you brought up.
Actually, there's quite a few different things you brought up.
I think that's interesting around you said the Tesla one's kind of near a national
park, correct?
Or?
Yeah, it's I mean they're supposed to be these initial rounds are on alternative
fuel corridors So there's you know, every state has a certain amount of designated
mileage on these corridors and one of them from Maine aside from the big I -95 route
up to Canada is I think it's Route 1 along the coast kind of coastal main from the
Portland area and then across to Acadia National Park so big tourist route There's
a lot of cute little coastal main towns lighthouses all the stuff you associate
with a good main trip But this is a nice little town kind of a harbor
and
Tesla just, for whatever reason, that was the first site they managed to get in the
ground and was activated, I think, in April.
But it's interesting that that has kind of pushed them to develop a new piece of the
puzzle, right?
Because they now need to, you know, and all the other things that we could talk
about with public access for superchargers.
This is something that has been to receive those federal funds.
They had to have different kind of payment reader, the ability to display the, you
know, cost per charge and have basic charging information displayed that would
normally be pushed to the
because that's you know all designed in Harris so it's starting to make that force
even Tesla to make that transition to as much of a public charging provider as they
wish to be.
Yeah.
And I think that's definitely, that could be unto itself, its own podcast, just kind
of like the app experience versus, I mean, that was kind of what I reiterated.
I even think tweeted or whatever you call it now on a Twitter X whatever.
the other day after I had my bad experiences, like for EV's to really take
up, it's gotta be just as easy as filling up with gas.
If not easier from a payment standpoint.
And I had a download two apps, put my credit card in three times.
Apple pay doesn't work even though it has an Apple pay option.
And just like, I cannot think of literally just such a bad experience.
And so I think that's great to see, like you just need sometimes if you want to
take the next level with kind of an app augmentation or kind of a software layer,
great.
But, for, I think all these different technologies that take off, they just have
to work and the simplicity around just having a payment terminal and, ideally in
a good world, it'd have like a plug and charge.
sort of situation where it's even simpler than gas.
You just plug in and walk away.
Don't even think about it.
I think that that makes the charging process, you know, when you talk about it,
futzing around and spending three or four minutes to get it working.
If you can just do that plug and charge and that becomes the standard, then it
does take advantage over gas.
You're not doing the card reader potential for skimming your data, you know, all that
kind of stuff.
It cuts out.
And as long as it works, you can do exactly what Tesla owners do walk away to
the store.
passive kind of activity where the car charges whilst you do your stuff and then
it starts to become a you know additive bonus because when you're fueling you're
just fueling right that you've got to stand there you've got to hold the pump
you've got to unless someone's there to do it for you like New Jersey or a few of
those handful of states but for the most part you can go and do your other stuff
while you're charging come back to the charge car and be on your way again.
No, I mean, I, it saves, it seems simple, but it saves so much time on a road trip.
If you're doing like back to back ones, just do plug them, walk away, go use the
bathroom, get back in the car and go again.
but yeah, that, not to do, I mean, I, I get it.
The experience I had is rare, but it's just like, this is so unacceptable in
2024.
where, yeah, it had a card reader and the career doesn't even work.
And I had to even find out like through just double checking and plug share that
was like,
Coming soon, payment terminal functionality.
And that was, I believe, from the CPO back in like early 2023.
And clearly it just never came, even though it has the terminal right there.
And so I think just hearing all these stories.
up EVCS with Eric because I'm sure he's got war stories from them as well.
look forward to it and I want to commiserate with them because yeah, it's
just, it's unfortunate because, they've got so many great sites that were funded
by the state of Oregon to upgrade.
And in my experience so far has been a missed opportunity, but, going back to
kind of the rollout of the larger sites.
I mean, what are you guys seeing as far as kind of like the ideal layout?
I realized we're kind of coming up short on time here.
So I just wanted to kind of figure out.
just on the last thing on the Nevi funding, like, do you want to see, cause I
think so many of these like early public fast charging installations, they might
only be like four, maybe even up to six.
And it really does seem like to make this model work.
And you're starting to even see it at Bucky's and these other ones where they
are doing also the very large charging, look, stall locations and stuff like that.
And I just be curious to kind of hear what your guys thoughts on our, like what the
ideal, if we're going to give.
the NEVI funding to these locations.
Like what should be the ideal minimum size, like minimum power?
I know it's stated, but like, it's just been interesting to me what has been
chosen versus what I think is kind of the more ideal and future -proofed solution
for these sites.
I can go first.
I think there's two school of thoughts and I might just be speculating, but I think
there's two school of thoughts.
One is the longevity of the host and their viability long -term economically, whether
or not they're going to be closing.
So you want to gravitate more towards like community colleges or government
institutions that will be around for a very long time, but that might not be in
convenient locations or expediency, which are the convenience stores immediately off
the interstates.
Those are kind of the two main areas.
that I seem to be focused on.
And my personal opinion is the C -Store is right off the interstate, but real estate
is pretty good.
And as long as it doesn't get overly expensive for taxes, the charging stations
themselves will help sustain the business model of the C -Store.
So in my opinion, those are the nicest where you don't have to walk a long way to
an anchor mall in order to go to a food court.
It's just, you know, 10 steps away where you go inside and you have the facilities.
You can get yourself a Slurpee or whatever you want.
So my personal opinion is the C -Store is immediately off the interstate for road
trips.
inside urban areas or for people in multi -tenant dwellings, seat stores or grocery
stores.
Yeah, I think what we're seeing with Nevi is just the minimum being complied, you
know, to get the money because Walter kind of pointed out they are looking, a lot of
these players are looking to get a foot in the water.
They're not trying to build out a massive charging hub as Tesla's had to do at some
locations because they have the sheer volume and demand for it.
They're just trying to add on those four ports, which are the requirement, the
minimum 150 kilowatts, although a lot of them do go higher in various
configurations.
and get those in the ground.
So they start to gather data, they get some federal funding for it, they start to
offset some of those early, you know, very high capex costs that come with installing
EV infrastructure.
and just build from there.
But I think in terms of the ideal charging station, Walter kind of hit on it in that
you really need to match it to the dual time of location.
You know, if I have a gas station which already has a canopy and a lot of the
creature comforts of a road trip, like your squeegees, your trash cans, stuff
that we take for granted as travelers, you have to have those for the electric
vehicle traveler as well.
You need those as part of the makeup.
It's a bizarre thing to have some big piece of construction and then kind of
forgo.
or some of the basic amenities.
When you get to a town centre and some of those other locations, if things are
walkable, then maybe a lower power is fine.
Maybe you just need a bunch of lower power equipment that you can install and that
may be a benefit for the town and the kind of people and businesses that are looking
to benefit from this investment because then people do walk around the town, start
to frequent the local businesses and use the facilities that are around them.
So I think it varies from place to place.
Some places you may want the kind of Electrify America charging hub that you
have in downtown San Francisco with lounges and facilities and 20 chargers in
places like the middle of Wyoming where you'd be in chase.
I doubt you would want, I mean, you may want one, but probably not going to get
one anytime soon.
No.
And I think what Walter says is pretty spot on.
you, you want something that has the right facility or the right, amenities, but at
the same time, like, yeah, that is kind of where, like you're saying a two 50, three
50, like something higher power.
So it's like 15 minutes.
Usually kind of bathroom break, get a water or whatever, and you've got enough
charge to kind of get on your way for another couple hours.
Whereas like one 50.
Even though it's still a decent amount of power can actually start having like a
pretty big, Delta and how much time you might be sitting there to charge.
And then it becomes kind of a different thing.
If you're at a mall or a city center, like you're saying where it's like, okay, it's
lower power, but I can go do something a bit more than hanging out at a gas station
or a convenience store.
But what were you going to say, Walter?
I was going to say another thing I'm hearing with some frequency is the safety
issue and lighting and having a staff member at a convenience store is
beneficial because being alone in a mall parking lot at night is not something that
is conducive to feeling safe for other EV drivers.
Myself, I'm kind of the scary person so I don't worry about that.
Other people apparently are, I'm hearing that more and more that the convenience
stores generally are sought after.
because there's a staff member on site and the safety issue and the lighting and
everything.
No, I think that's a great call.
And like kind of the evil turn that we've seen is like what Steve was talking about,
like the electrify America, one in San Francisco where it is gated off.
There's other stuff there.
And so it is more secure, but the, and you, you see actually more of these in
Europe.
And I think kind of like the Mercedes bins one they did domestically, but obviously
then the expenditures of that and that investment goes way up.
And so I think you're totally right that there's a pretty good overlap.
There's already so much of the infrastructure and kind of safety elements
built in with the traditional C stores that it just makes sense to have more EV
chargers there.
And I realized we're kind of coming up on our time here and I want to be respectful.
I know Steve, you wanted to kind of talk a little bit about nursery charging.
So maybe we can just talk about that for like the last couple of minutes and kind
of share some of your thoughts on what your experience with that has been before
we sign off here.
I'm sure you might be jumping into another podcast with.
know yeah, maybe let's let's maybe start with and think of it as more of a teaser
for the next episode But I just want to make sure we cover it with the time
well, I know I visited the.
Gravity charging hub, which is one of the big kind of headline 500 kilowatts for
whatever the technology behind that is, that's open to debate.
But, you know, the idea of having 20, 30 charges in the center of downtown
Manhattan that can fill a car in 15, 20 minutes is an interesting one and called a
lot of headlines.
But I found myself thinking more and more, you know, we had we spoke to the co
-founder of its electric, one of the curbside charging solutions, which is
purely level two.
And there's a lot of these vault posts in New York City you have.
flow installing very high utilization.
curbside charging and to me you know the experience was fine at the Gravity Center
but I was that was a dedicated activity I had to do I mean I filmed a video but I
went there to do that and to check it out but I wasn't able to go and take advantage
of any of the things in Midtown Manhattan because I needed to be back to my car
because it was faster whereas if I'd have been able to plug in you know on a level 2
you're kind of 7 -8 kilowatts it charges perfectly reasonably I'm probably gonna
enjoy downtown Manhattan for four or five six hours and then I'm going to on
way with much the same amount of energy as I left with with the dedicated fast
charging stop and probably install a lot more of those curbside chargers for the
money that it costs to build a charging hub.
So I think there's value in having both obviously as a ride share driver or maybe
a commercial fleet driver you need to have that quick charging stop time is money and
you need to be on your way but as a visitor and maybe a local business I'm
just thinking more and more that we can't or really shouldn't overlook that level
two charging it's a valuable piece of the puzzle that
those solutions that I mentioned are going to be a big part of, I think.
Yeah, I can agree more in that.
I think there's a lot of really interesting level two DC charging options
that are kind of starting to hit the market now that are kind of the right
balance and actually bring down costs even further, especially if you are like a
parking garage or a large building where you actually probably have easier access
to DC.
And you can kind of tap into them and have a large scale facility and have more DC.
It's not going to be 350 kilowatts, but even if it's anywhere from like 10 to 20,
that's still like plenty and makes a lot more scalable and easier for those kinds
of experiences.
Cause yeah, I think you're totally right with the investment and also just like
being able to be more efficient with the time.
of leveraging level two charging when you are in a place like Manhattan or somewhere
else.
And it's not that you need a fast charge.
You just need a consistent charge reliably.
and go into the exactly.
And, and I think that's also, I think we talked about this on our previous episode
too, where it's like the importance of having commercial specific charging only.
If you're going to be an Uber, you're going to be someone there needs to be.
an option that kind of makes it so that's where they go instead of always having to
go to the public chargers and then maybe people who are on their trips, taking up a
stall and running the issues.
Like we saw this past winter.
I, I do realize we're kind of up for time and I, and I just want to say thank you
both.
I know Walter we've gone over.
So Walter, Steve, thank you so much.
We'll have to have you guys on again soon and, really enjoyed this conversation
today.
Thanks, Chase Good night.
Thank you.
Thank you for listening to this episode of the grid connections podcast.
We hope you enjoyed our conversation with Steve briquette founder of plug and play
EV and Walter Schulze, the host of the network architect channel.
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