First DCQC Unit in the East Coast Express Charging Corridor Installed

An i3 sits next to a 24kW DC Fast Charge unit during the announcement of the BMW, VW & ChargePoint joint venture earlier this year. 

It's been seven months since BMW, along with Volkswagen and ChargePoint announced a joint venture which would install roughly 100 DC fast charge units on the East and West coasts. While there's been a lot of work identifying potential locations and negotiating with site managers, there hasn't really been any tangible progress that electric vehicle owners could see.  

The plan is to create "Express Charging Corridors" on both coasts, with DC Fast Charge stations placed no more than 50 miles apart. The East Coast Corridor will connect Washington DC to Boston, Massachusetts and the West Coast Corridor would extend from San Diego, California to Portland, Oregon.  There would be two kinds of DC Fast Charge stations utilized. The stations placed directly on the highway locations of the corridors would be 50kW units, most of which will be dual head CCS & CHAdeMO stations. Then, on secondary locations slightly off the direct corridors, 24kW CCS-only units will be placed. While these 24kW units aren't necessarily quite fast enough to be convenient for long distance travel of hundreds of miles, they are very useful for intercity travel and charge at three to four times the speed of standard level 2 public charging.

ChargePoint's East and West Coast Express Charging Corridor Infographic

I applied, and was recently approved under the program guidelines to have one of the 24kW units installed on my commercial property in Montclair New Jersey.  I'm currently awaiting the permits to be approved and hope to have the station installed and working before my National Drive Electric Week event on September 12th. Always the competitor, I was also hoping to be the first East Coast public location in the program to get a station installed, but I'm actually happy to report that won't be the case. That's because a friend of mine and fellow BMW i3 owner, Bruce Redman Becker has beaten me to it. Bruce, and architect and developer, is responsible for 777 Main Street in Hartford Connecticut, a newly developed 285 unit apartment building with a 250 car parking garage. In describing the location to me, Bruce had this to say:

"The site is just two blocks from exits off I-91 and off I-84.  We have one SAE combo DC fast charger and 10 level 2 chargers (3 duals in the surface lot and 2 duals up the ramp within the covered garage).  Power  for all 11 Chargepoint chargers comes from a 400kw fuel cell adjacent to the chargers that also provides renewable clean energy to heat and power the apartment tower�.We have three coffee shops on our block, including a Blue State Coffee on the first floor of 777 Main opening in September.  And there are over a dozen great restaurants nearby as well as a great camera shop, CVS, banks and the Hartford Atheneum museum to enjoy while charging."

An i3 using the DC Fast Charger at 777 Main Street, Hartford Connecticut 

So while none of the main corridor, 50kW units have been installed yet, it seems the secondary, 24kW stations are beginning to materialize here on the East Coast, which is welcome news. I know some i3 owners have been frustrated by the seemingly lack of action with regards to the DC Fast Charge roll out, but I also know first hand that BMW and ChargePoint have been working very hard to locate potential locations, negotiate site agreements and collect bids for the installation. They've been at it for half a year now and I believe we're going to begin to see some real progress made in the next couple months. Getting the first one up and running can sometime seem like the biggest hurdle in programs like this. Well, now that that's done I'm optimistic that in the next six months we'll see dramatic progress made on both coasts. 

Three 24kW DCFC units have been up and running at BMW Headquarters in Woodcliff Lake, NJ since January. They are open to the public and free to use.

i3 Owner Explains Her 312 Mile All Electric Day

Kris charging up at an NRG Fast Charge station

One of the many things that Tesla Motors understands as well as anybody is how a robust Fast Charge network will liberate their customers from being on an "Electric Leash." Ubiquitous DC fast charging stations are, in my opinion, just as important as longer range electric vehicles. In fact, they may even be more important.

BMW apparently shares that opinion and has recently announced that they are getting into the DC fast charge game with a partnership that includes Volkswagen and ChargePoint, and will be installing fast chargers at 50 mile intervals on the East and West coasts to create "Express Charging Corridors." However it won't end with there. BMW is going to continue to invest in DC fast charge infrastructure here in the US, as they realize that they need to participate in creating the foundation for BMW i to succeed.

As with most things EV-related, California is ahead of most of the US when it comes to DC fast charge infrastructure. While the SAE Combo (CCS) fast charge units are only beginning to be installed, there are some already in the ground there, and they are allowing people to take their i3s further in a shorter period of time than they could if they were relying on 240v Level 2 public charging.

Kris & I at a recent i3 meet

Which brings me to the story below that I found interesting.  My friend Kris Kluzak, a former ActiveE Electronaut, offered to write a guest post for this blog detailing a day when she drove her i3 312 miles using public charging infrastructure.  It shows that even a medium-range EV, like the i3, can easily cover hundreds of miles in a day if the appropriate infrastructure is in place.

Here's how it went down, in Kris's words:
 



A 312 mile, all electric day in a BMW i3 REx:

On November 11th, 2014 I was scheduled for a research study for my car in Sherman Oaks, California. From my house in East San Diego County, it is about 160-mile trip one-way.

On any given day this �normal� trip would take approximately 3-4+ hours in any vehicle with an engine (ICE) as the main power source. Those of us living in Southern California know the different routes to take to avoid traffic blunders, and are often looking for the carpool lane when it�s an option.

In order to arrive on time for my 2pm appointment, my husband and I had to build in a few charge/food stops; this set us to leave right after 8am. First, we stopped 39 miles away at the Carlsbad Premium Outlets to charge and grab coffee at Starbucks. *We charged for 30 minutes knowing we had enough range to reach our next stop in Santa Ana. 
 

Like me, Kris's previous electric car was a BMW ActiveE

We next stopped at Crevier BMW, 58 miles from Carlsbad. Just days prior they had installed four DCQC (SAE Combo) stations and we were on a mission to check them out. Normally we would not choose this route through Los Angeles, but since it was a Federal holiday we took advantage of the �lighter� traffic. We charged for an hour while our SOC (state of charge) reached 99%. While we didn�t plan to stay that long, we enjoyed talking to the "iGenius" in the new "iBuilding".  There was also a Starbucks and restroom on site for us to use.  We left there with our next intended stop in Sherman Oaks, not knowing for sure where we would charge, but would look once we got up there.  I was fully prepared to have my range extender kick in if needed, but I really was trying to do this trip without it.

We found that the local KIA dealership claimed to have an ABB charger, which is the same unit that NRG eVgo uses (yes, CHAdeMO and SAE Combo). We called to see if - 1) the charger exists, which it does, and 2) to see if we could charge, which we were told yes, to come on by.  It was a few miles from the Sherman Oaks location, so off we went.  The charger was blocked, but they immediately moved a car and allowed us to charge.  Unfortunately, the charger was so new, that it hadn�t been provisioned yet, and did not work.  At this point I had 22 miles of range, and 27 miles to the next, known Freedom Station in Hermosa Beach.  So we set off, knowing my range extender would probably kick in.

With some luck, and HEAVY Los Angeles traffic on the 405, we managed to get to Hermosa Beach with 6 miles to spare, and no REx usage.  I drove **83.3 miles on that one charge from Crevier. Once at Hermosa Beach, we managed to find the charger, a nearby bar offering Taco Tuesday, and managed to do all of this while just getting a 30 minute charge. Next stop, the Westminster Shopping Mall ***27 miles away.  We arrived at the mall with no range issues, and were able to charge again for just 30 minutes.  FroYo and a potty stop�and away to Carlsbad for the last stop.

We arrived in Carlsbad, once again hit the Starbucks and charged for only 20 minutes, enough charge to get home.  We were there about 30 minutes, but the charger faulted and stopped early.  We arrived home at just before 10pm.  312 total miles driven, all electric, no REx used, and all charges were free.  We spent a few dollars at Starbucks and for the dinner, but overall, did the whole trip for less than $50, all-inclusive.



Some key points to this trip:

I did not use any climate control until the last leg, there was no need for heating or cooling, but I had to run the defrosters a few times for the last 30 miles.

I ran the entire trip in Eco Pro driving mode.

I preconditioned the car that morning prior to leaving, hoping to warm the batteries before the trip for maximum range.

I purposely did not use the carpool lane. While this might have been necessary in another situation where time was an issue, I preferred to stay in the traffic in order to get maximum range. 

The total time spent portal to portal was 14 hours. I was at the research facility for almost 3 hours, and then we spent almost another 45 minutes to an hour at the Kia dealership talking to the manager about the charger, and looking at their Soul EVs.

Charging added 3 hours, which by using the DC quick charging options, made this a very reasonable trip.  If we had stopped in an ICE for breakfast and dinner, and potty stops, the total stoppage time would have been less, but not significantly, maybe an hour less, overall.

Kris and her "Storm Trooper" Capparis White i3. She's wearing a limited edition i3 Super Bowl jersey that BMW made for this year's game to go along with the i3 commercial that aired during the first quarter. 

My Personal Records:

312 all electric miles in one day (previously 187 in my Active E, which did not have L3 charging)

83.3 all electric miles in one charge (previously 80 miles, in the summer, while hypermiling and drafting behind a truck for 20+ miles)

Cheapest day EVER to drive 312 miles, food and energy included.

*These outlets have two NRG eVgo charging options: level 2 and level 3. The level 2 option has one universal J1772 plug, and the level 3 option has a CHAdeMO (for Nissan Leaf�s, Kia Soul�s, and other Asian brand EVs) as well as a SAE combo (CCS) (for BMW�s, VW eGolf, etc.). This Freedom Station powered by NRG eVgo is part of free fast charging offered by BMW. 

**This car will definitely do better on range with slower speeds, ie: bumper-to-bumper traffic, and city stop-and-go vs full, freeway speeds.

***The mileage between Hermosa Beach and Carlsbad is 87.1 miles.  While we could have easily avoided a stop and used the REx, I would have been forced to charge longer at Hermosa to get a bigger charge, thus not saving any time AND using gasoline.

Did The DC Quick-Charging 'Standards War' Just Quietly End For Electric Cars?

A BMW i3 and a Volkswagen e-Golf charge on DC fast chargers side by side at BMW Headquarters in Woodcliff Lake NJ.

I wrote this article for Green Car Reports, where it was published a few days ago. The proliferation of a robust DC fast charge network is vital to electric vehicle adoption, and I wanted to give this story as wide an audience as possible, which is way I let GCR publish it first. Now that they had it for a while, I'd like to share it with the readers here.

I was invited up to BMW NA headquarters by BMW product manager Jose Guerrero to try out the new DC fast chargers installed there. There are three of them, along with four Level 2 EVSEs, all of which are open to the public 24/7.

A couple weeks ago at the DC Auto Show, BMW, Volkswagen, and ChargePoint jointly announced they would install about 100 DC fast chargers for electric cars. Their goal is to create �Express Charging Corridors,� on both the East and West coasts, by the end of this year. The most intriguing news, however, was that the hardware will--in most cases--offer fast charging for electric cars using two different standards: CCS (used by BMW and VW) and CHAdeMO, used by Japanese and Korean automakers.

The three DC fast chargers at BMW NA HQ are CCS only. The reason being is these are not directly included in the Express Charging Corridors, but secondary locations which are more likely to support local driving, not long distance traveling.

I say �most cases� because not every single location will have a dual-standard fast charger that provides CHAdeMO, although most will. Today, CHAdeMO stations are far more widely installed in certain areas--totaling several hundred in the U.S.--than CCS stations, of which only a few dozen exist today. The "Express Charging Corridor" project will determine whether a desired location is close to an existing CHAdeMO station. If so, that location will provide only CCS cables.

I suspect this may only happen in a few locations, largely on the West Coast, since the East Coast has very few operational CHAdeMO stations to date. The East Coast corridor will connect Boston to Washington, D.C., while the West Coast corridor will extend from Portland to San Diego. Both corridors will have DC fast chargers installed at intervals of less than 50 miles, making it possible--if tedious--to do long-distance trips in electric cars with ranges of 75 to 90 miles, including the BMW i3 and the Volkswagen e-Golf.

Then, less than a week after the DC Auto Show, Kansas City Power & Light announced that it had partnered with Nissan and ChargePoint to install 1,000 electric-vehicle charging stations throughout the greater Kansas City region.


That in itself is fantastic news. But if you drill down into the press release, you will find that only 15 of the stations will be DC fast charge stations--a little disappointing. However, these 15 stations �will charge any model of electric vehicle on the market,� meaning they too will support both CHAdeMO and CCS. So BMW and Volkswagen�s project will provide CHAdeMO charging, and Nissan�s endeavor will include CCS support.

These Efacec units will be installed along the new "Express Charging Corridors" by ChargePoint and support both CHAdeMO and CCS

What just happened here?

Did the automakers all quietly agree to support both standards, so every electric-car driver can benefit? I interviewed BMW�s Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Manager, Robert Healey, on the morning of the DC Auto Show. He told me BMW has no problem with supporting dual-standard stations, because the main goal is to advance the proliferation of charging infrastructure for plug-in cars as rapidly as possible.

CHAdeMO and CCS connector side by side comparison.

He went on to say that in these early stages of adoption, �a rising tide raises all boats�--and this kind of cooperation among competitors is in everyone�s best interest. While he couldn�t elaborate or speculate on the future, Healey said he would be open to similar partnerships with other automakers, should the opportunity arise.

So it's looking more and more as though the DC fast-charge standards war that everyone was predicting may be over, really before the first shot was even fired. I hope so, because if this trend continues, everybody indeed wins. Especially electric-car drivers--not only today's, but the many more to come.

BMW Initiates "Light and Charge" Pilot Program

It seems BMW has been busy developing new ways to charge your i3 or i8 lately. A few months ago I posted information on BMWs new low cost DC Fast charger and I just got word from an i3 owner in California that the first one is already up and will soon be ready for use at Crevier BMW in Santa Ana, California.

A member of the i3 Facebook group posted this picture from Crevier BMW. BMW's new DC fast charge station has just recently been installed there.

The latest news out of Munich is BMW's "Light the Charge" program. BMW has developed LED streetlights that also have built in charging stations. They already have a couple of them in place outside their Munich headquarters, and will soon begin installing them around the city of Munich for a pilot program. The units will be networked and allow the customer to pay with a credit card or by swiping an RFID card from a partner charging network provider. In the US, BMW's charging partner for ChargeNow is ChargePoint.

The European version of BMW's light pole charging station. In Europe, the EV driver carries the cable that plugs into their car as well as the EVSE. Here in the US, the cable is permanently tethered to the EVSE.

The obvious issue with adding charging stations to light poles is available capacity. Will the utilities have to pull new wires to accommodate the added demand or are they already over sized and can handle the additional load? In Europe the standard electrical supply is 230v so there is already more available power than we have here in the US where the basic household supply is 120v. I'd imagine most light poles here are typically 120v, but I'm not 100% certain about that. Pulling new wires and upgrading the lights could prove very costly, more so than even installing stand along charging stations, but I could see how using these on new light pole installations would work.

Charging stations on all these light poles would be great for workplace charging, airports and shopping malls.

Besides street side parking, I could also see how this approach would work well for large parking lots. Instead of having the charging stations all located in one place, which typically is a desirable location close to the buildings, they could be scattered all over the parking area, and each light pole could service the four parking spaces surrounding it.

Whether this idea comes to fruition and becomes a reality beyond the pilot program is unknown at this time, but I like that BMW is really giving thought to how they can improve public charging for their customers. The maturation of the public charging infrastructure is crucial for mass electric vehicle adoption, and I hope BMW continues to explore new ways to help make it ubiquitous.