The key elements include six high speed charging hubs on motorways capable of charging eight vehicles simultaneously; 16 high speed charging hubs capable of charging four vehicles simultaneously; additional high power chargers at 34 current 50 kW locations; upgrading over 50 22 kW chargers to 50 kW, and replacing up to 264 locations with 528 charge points at the pre-existing pilot grade of 22 kW to next generation high reliability models.
Sandyford SuC shows €0.60c for off-peak and €0.67c for peak pricing.
I wonder will it deter the taxis?
I was in the square earlier. A taxi leaf was just coming off the 50kw. An ID4 taxi pulled in immediately. Another ID4 taxi was waiting opposite it. I parked at the 22kw and started charging. As I was walking away another ID4 taxi pulled in beside the one waiting.
My local "fast" charger is Templeville and I can't remember the last time I've passed it that there isn't a taxi either charging or waiting to charge.
Not surprising they have upped the charges, I knew I wasn't going to get a fast charge at a rate cheaper than my home day rate for long. Still some increase though, around 50%.
Will taxi drivers get home chargers now? Although I assume the ones hogging the fast chargers can't.
With those price increases I wlll close my eCars 'members' account and go Easy-go exclusive. They now seem to be lower cost on many of their own sites and on say Lidls network, while still offfering eCars locations if I need them.
ECars membership probably never made sense for my usage, but I kept it out of laziness. I accepted the price changes earlier in 2022 as energy inflation, these new prices seem excessive to me vs average domestic (never mind commercial) rates.
I have thought for some time that charging providers will gravitate to the same cost/km as diesel and petrol. This is because motorists elastically bear the cost of petrol / diesel, eve when they sharply incline. EV drivers like any other motorist have the same transport needs. Ionity proved this in ROI, and others are following. And at around 15c a kilometre, I believe ESB eCars are in that ball park now, and I would suggest they will stay there even when electricity prices eventually fall.
Awaiting volumes of press commentary showing car charging is now more expensive than diesel or petrol; these articles will ignore that EV drivers can charge at home (and still in some places for free), because the net point must be that going EV is still a mad move. These Perfect timing for 231 car sale advertorials.
Membership for ecars never made sense, unless you are charging like 2-3 times a week. Easygo charge a % on top to use their card on the ecars chargers.
My car - 2022 m3 RWD - has enough range to get me to north dublin and return, without charging, from a home charge. If you imagine that is a 125-150 km radius around my house there's not a lot of times I'd need to charge. People get confused on these things comparing FCP/HCP costs with petrol. You dont have access to 7c/kWh petrol at home so even if half your charging is public charging (in which case you bought the wrong car), you have half at home for nearly free. When I commuted to work I could charge at 22kW at work for free.
The amount of posts I see online from people who bought their first EV and it was an MEB car, or a new model 3, and they say they never fast charge at all as the car covers all range far outweighs those relying on public charging only. I'd suggest that is not a good decision these days anyway, don't buy an EV without home charging
And if you're on an AC43 Triple head you have to pay 65c for the privilege.😮
Close to diesel money for an old unreliable charger.
I am the same as you, we have 2 EVs / no ICEs, one of our EVs has 400km range, and I have free charging at work (albeit I mainly wfh). I would say 90% or more of my charging by km is at home / office and at (I think) 8.5c night rate or free. I am a very happy EV driver with zero range anxiety and smugly aware that EVs are far lower total cost cars than ICE. I am re-investing my savings on motoring into solar.
But it doesn't matter what you or I already know. What I think will happen is motoring journalists will use the new ESB rates to work out the cost of a km in EV vs the cost of a km in diesel and that will be the headline. I heard the head of Maxol on Newstalk last week where he went completely unchallenged saying that the rising cost of electricity removed any savings from going EV (he also said that BEVs were an insignificant % of fleet). These kind of claims will reduce EV take-up.
Gas been used today will be costing a price from weeks/months ago.
Would take time for lower prices to filter through into lower energy cost.
Also buying gas in advance is more expensive than day ahead
France cheaper cause mainly nuclear
This is the big problem with these price increases.....
The ICE driver looks at them and thinks that the EV world will be a total disaster.
The good news however is that these energy price issues impact everyone whether you drive an EV or not.
So action much more likely to be taken when you consider that the local shop, factory or hotel all of which provide jobs - are impacted.
Ironically Maxol in the North are currently building a new filling station with a charging hub at it.
Did the Maxol guy on newstalk say if they had any EV plans in 26 counties
These kind of claims will reduce EV take-up.
It may have some impact, but at the end of the day it doesnt really matter. The single biggest factor in EV takeup is Govt Policy.
It’s price gouging on a grand scale, wholesale gas prices falling for the last 4 months and in October were at 50% of the August prices. Not to mention that Wind power is surely not affected by Russia. Government electricity subsidies only fuelling the issue.
Last time eCars jacked up their prices, EasyGO followed within days. History tends to repeat itself.
50% of august is still many times higher than January
Maxol in NI singing a totally different tune
I wonder if 26 county Maxol is hoping for Government to step up and provide financial incentives for providers of public EV infrastructure
Here is an article from Irish Times re: Maxol, same day as their interview on Newstalk.
https://www.irishtimes.com/business/2022/11/17/maxol-casts-light-on-governments-climate-lethargy/
Its behind a paywall, but here are some of the comments in it.
"Amid reports the Government may scale back its plan to have one million such vehicles on Irish roads by 2030, Maxol chief executive Brian Donaldson told reporters on Tuesday the firm is not minded go out and build EV hubs at its branches in the Republic. “There isn’t a business case to support that,” he said."
It goes on to say it will begin rolling out an EV strategy, with hub to open in North. But then cites the problems. "One issue with the rollout, however, is grid capacity and the sheer volume of electricity required to operate the five-charger facility, equivalent to the electricity consumption of 12-14 houses, he said."
Like getting power for a dozen houses - a once off job - is insurmountable, or that a fuel station typically has 30,000 or more litres of fuel capacity (twice as much fuel per day that 12 houses would use in a year), or that those tanks must be filled daily with oil from across the planet, etc, etc,etc.
He then finishes by saying that EVs are not really selling anyway. "Moreover, despite a significant uptick in sales of hybrids and EVs in recent years, demand for fossil-fuelled vehicles remains robust and Donaldson said Maxol doesn’t envisage a significant drop-off in fuel sales until possibly the 2030s."
No surprise that oil man wants to keep selling oil, the point is these stories print / broadcast without any counter commentary & Joe & Jane soap say they might go EV next time they change their car.
I love how he's put it into perspective with his own quote
"One issue with the rollout, however, is grid capacity and the sheer volume of electricity required to operate the five-charger facility, equivalent to the electricity consumption of 12-14 houses, he said."
That's hilarious, I think what he meant to say was "we don't want to pay what ESBN is demanding for a grid connection"
To be fair, I suspect that for Maxol the business case is a bit more dubious because they don't have a franchise shop IIRC
Applegreen and Circle K have their own shops (to the extent that Circle K is now replacing Londis shops). So they easily profit by drivers being stuck there for a while
Not sure Maxol have the same motivation when they're profit sharing with other shop franchises
Believe it or not there are very few able to afford spending €55k+ on a car and live so close to Dublin.
There are some who rely heavily on our public charging infrastructure, maybe because they didn't get the same start in life as yourself, maybe they're still renting and the landlord won't put in a charger on the driveway or maybe they're living in an apartment. For these people their cost of driving will have almost doubled in less than a year.
Believe it or not some people even bought their car to actually drive it, sometimes long distances that involves public charging, so they get hit.
I get how you don't care or maybe even see a problem in people who aren't you getting hit by these hikes but posts like yours give legitimacy to this frankly ridiculous hike by ecars
For comparison to ICE fuels, Diesel was ~€1.60 last year and today when I passed the pumps it was about €1.90, an increase of 18% in the year
My point is that European electricity wholesale prices are a bad comparison to make when hiking your own price. Also are ESB (of which ecars is a subsidiary) not the main wholesaler in this country?
Lucky you... Some aren't as fortunate when it comes to EV charging
With regards to the head of Maxol's comments, under the current ecars rates it would cost €9.57, €11 or €11.59 to do 100km on an ESB charger (AC, FC, HPC) for a 17kWh/100km car.
A petrol car that does 43-53mpg (5.35-6.44L/100km) on €1.80/L will cost the same. Now I accept that would be a very economical petrol car and there are other factors such as servicing but the gap is definitely closing and in some cases, Ionity for example, the Electric car will cost more per km driven so he isn't completely wrong
I hear you. This certainly hits people with no chargers at home far harder, it is an extortionate price rise by any measure and its clear to me that eCars are protecting a margin / not absorbing any of the wholesale cost rise. They also lead the market and others will follow suit. Again, I believe car charging networks know the market will bear high pricing, and that essentially the cost of driving an EV is being set to match the cost of fossil fuel per km, not the unit or wholesale cost of electricity.
What is happening is that charger providers are transferring the one of the key benefits of ev ownership (low cost motoring) for themselves. They keep the difference between cost of electricity and cost of diesel. When CEO of Maxol cops on to that, he might change his tune, as the margin per 1,000 km must be 50 times greater than the margin on diesel.
The effect of these price rises , as mentioned just 1hr ago by Geraldine Herbert on Newstalk, is that EVs are now a "harder sell". Geraldine, who I always regarded as a fair commentator on EVs, now recommends not buying an EV unless you can charge at home. Very sensible, very fair comment. People driving diesel and petrol cars, guess what, don't have home charging - so getting this alien machine, sorting an install, completing paperwork, paying out more money - this is another 'mad' barrier to moving to EV when all you want is a 231 as soon as.
Someone above mentioned government policy as being key to EV take up. Public network charging rates used to be free 'by policy', its clear they are no longer an instrument of public policy.
As good a start as me? Excuse me? I was kicked out/left home at 17. I worked in mcdonalds for over 2 years, I'm a college dropout and I'm autistic. I don't think I got a good start at all. I worked very hard to be where I am. I also don't live close to Dublin, 120km is over an hour and a half driving most days.
If you bought an EV and need to public charge it, these prices are representative of the costs of electricity. Have you tried to price up a commercial connection to the grid, with an MIC of 50-250kW? The rates for just the electricity excluding MIC charges are above 50c.
I've had a charger installed at my apartment (before I sold it and moved here). Before that I rented and charged on a granny cable - doing 60k km a year in a 24kWh leaf.
Posts like yours really really irk me. Assuming I'm from some silver spoon or something because I can afford a 50k car. Nonsense.
Look up commercial electricity tariffs. Look up MIC demand charges and the penalty for exceeding these. Then tell me how selling electricity at a fancy 100-150k charger for similar rates to the base electricity rate is gouging? I actually don't see how these make money.
He just has a massive chip on his shoulder, it comes across in a lot of his posts on this forum and others on Boards.
Geraldine, who I always regarded as a fair commentator on EVs, now recommends not buying an EV unless you can charge at home
I'd dispute this. Forget the price of electricity rising and comparisons to petrol. Given the lack of charging infrastructure in this country, if you cant change at home (or work), then buying an EV has never made much sense.
My comment on Govt Policy on EV take up doesnt relate to the price of electricty. It relates primarily to taxation (VRT & Motor tax) and provision of charging infrastructure.
Govt policy is the most significant factor in determining the makeup of the national fleet.
@wassie, I ask the same question every time this question comes up, how much personal experience do you have of operating an EV as a daily driver without access to home or work charging?
We didn't have home charging for the first year of owning our Ioniq, and due to a change in personal circumstances I've not had access to a home charger since April. I now drive a car with a relatively small battery (28.9 kWh usable) and have no problem keeping it operating and on the road by charging it twice a week. There are a lot of other people also making it work.
Our charging infrastructure is woeful in this country, it's not going to improve due to demand from customers who use a DC charger every 6 months.
There is strict separation between consumers and suppliers on the single electricity market. ESB as generators can only sell to the wholesale market, ESB as a supply company have to buy from the single electricity market. eCars as a consumer will have a contract at commercial rates with ESB the supply company.
ESBN are another separate entity and operate under licence from Eirgrid to build, maintain, and operate the physical infrastructure of the grid, they are not allowed to give preferential treatment or pricing to ESB group companies, the funding for ESBN comes for the DUoS fees on a given connections billing.
Totally ignoring home charging?
This is all a result of an electricity pricing mechanism not fit for purpose, priced based on the most expensive available electrical generation cost.
This artificially drives wholesale/consumer electricity cost up.
Thankfully I've moved to a longer range EV for both of us so we are well sheltered from this increase, I do however see this as a huge negative in the uptake of EVs from those coming from a cost saving perspective, regardless of home charging opportunity which we have debated to death here over the years - folks on long runs/without ability to install home charge point etc.
The Gov need to ensure incentives counteract e.g. get rid of the motor tax, keep the Grant etc else we risk progress on EV uptake to date.
