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.
If your VW is compatible it would suggest P&C instead of Autocharge? There should also be an option to remove Autocharge in the app
Yes it sounds like a very beta rollout at the moment for sure but an interesting thing to watch
I just noticed that EV-database includes info on what vehicles support AutoCharge. Example:
That explains why it didn't work for me, car doesn't support AutoCharge or Plug&Charge.
UPDATE FROM ESB on NI-
o We have fixed 49 x 22kW chargers to date across all of NI
o We will continue our replacement programme for the remainder of Q1
o We are continuing to liaise with NIE on connection upgrades and land owners on host site agreements
o We are processing the ordering of upgrade and Hub equipment
o We hope to start our [DC] replacement programme in Q2 but this is dependent on NIE connections, supply chain and host site agreements which are causing delays
They’re being quick to throw NIE under the bus when they cause delays!
Well, they are also a ESB subsidiary...
As a network operator there is strict regulation, they are part of ESB group they are not allowed to give other ESB companies priority.
Yes but ecars are less likely to publicly criticise ESB as they are part of the same company. NIE, however, they wouldn't have the same problem doing
NIE are also an ESB Group company.
Just checked and... Yeah it is, every day is a learning day...
Maybe I’ve missed it but I’ve never seen them blame ESNB for delays though, only NIE.
I've not seen them mention supply chain issues and host site agreements on any Facebook post either. It's not exactly news to tell us that new charger installations take a while due to those 3 factors.
Quite possibly they were new to PHEV and just testing out the tech, since the OP mentioned it was a 241 RR. Otherwise it seems nonsensical to sit there for the sake of a full PHEV charge. Sounds like he wouldn't leave either until he got to 100%?
On the other hand while it's not strictly relevant, I've seen some strange behaviour when it comes to charging - Marlay Park in particular where it's free. A few months back I noticed a new RAV4 PHEV pull up next to the points in the main car park while they were both occupied. Roughly 2 hours later after I'd done a few laps of the park and walking back to the car, I saw they were still sitting there, clearly still waiting for a point to free up. I found this just bizarre when there's charging right across the road at the Lidl plus several others in the local area at Dundrum and Nutgrove from a quick glance on Plugshare.
Another time last year I was plugged in at the rear carpark in Marlay and came back after a while to find a Megane E-Tech in the opposite space - driver got out while I unplugged and said he'd been waiting about an hour and a half - at 54% battery... Both a case of people deciding that the chance of a few free kWh was worth sitting and waiting close to two hours for.
driver got out while I unplugged and said he'd been waiting about an hour and a half - at 54% battery
If someone said that to me… at a free charger.. I’d plug back in and leave the car there just to spite them…
😂 yea, sure you would.
It's the 3 year old and the ice-cream analogy. Brought my niece to a park and had a great day out with her, loads of fun and she was wreaked on return. Her mother asked her what she did all day and all she could say was "we got an ice cream and I spilled it on my top!".
All those drivers wanted was the free charge and to be able to brag about it; the day wasn't complete until they had acquired that 7kWh (2.50 EUR) of free energy - seemingly straight out of Leo's pocket. Highlight of their day before they dozed off on the 3-grand reclining couch.
It's that level of pettiness that got the chargers in Fernhill (Stepaside) closed.
He didn't have an attitude towards me to be fair, just came out with a face on him. Though he had trouble grasping the question when I asked was his battery almost flat - I was really trying to understand why he chose to wait there the good part of an afternoon rather than just find another local point. He just wanted a free charge.
Unless I am incorrect, the last price change ecars made was effective 20 December 2022. I am not aware of any recent announcements.
I've recently posted here to say that the Head of e-cars signalled in August a price reduction would likely come in Autumn 2023.
I know that ecars have fixed price contracts that by definition do not track wholesale rates. That said, the CSO now say wholesale electricity cost fell by 67% in the 12 months to Dec 2023. Link below.
E-cars at the timeof their last increase blamed "sustained higher wholesale energy costs" for the increases in 2022; it's fair to now ask why sustained reductions have not been followed by reducing tariffs.
E-cars also assured their customers that they would "keep our prices under constant review in the coming months'.
Again, it's only fair to ask why those reviews have not resulted in any movement as yet by e-cars.
We are well into 2024, prices are comparable to 2021, yet we are still priced at or about peak 2022.
Good post, nobody can disagree with anything you've said there, what's going on with energy and fuel prices is disgraceful.
It was a platitude as it was the in-thing at the time was to be talking about price reductions.
Costs such as inflation have risen since, so those reduced prices lost their allure when the bean-counters saw red on the spreadsheet.
I see that the high power ESB units (>50kw) are only 50 cent on the new Volvo card ( used to be over 80 cent previously)
When charging at a High Power unit and both CCS are in use, once one leaves shouldn’t the charge for the other one increase to 150?
Yes but it depends on the car and battery State of Charge (SoC). Also some units are power limited. Which HPC?
Knocklyon Shopping Centre. Car is an E-tron.
Maximum speed depends on the exact model of the car.
https://support.fastned.nl/hc/en-gb/articles/360000815988-Audi#:~:text=The%20charge%20speed%20for%20the%20Audi%20e%2Dtron%20GT%20is,minutes%20(50%20kW%20charger).
But also very critical is battery temperature. Most cars need a battery temperature around 30 Celsius for peak speeds. At this time of year your battery is probably 14 Celsius. Then if you look at the graphs on the link you see you need a low state of charge. Lastly the charger typically has limits, both in terms of sharing power across multiple connectors but also sites may have maximum grid limits and some sites these are low.
Some cars have an option to precondition the battery temperature before charging but even if you have this option it can take 1+ hours to go from a freezing winter battery to a toasty battery ready to peak maximum charge. Tesla cars automatically plan routes and charging stops and they try precondition battery and time stops and charging % at each stop to reduce total trip time.
Max I got on that unit was 86kW. On plugshare I see that's a record with most check-ins putting 70kW as an average. E-tron should charge over 100kW in most cases even at medium SoC.
Something wrong with that one. Tried to charge an i5 M60 last night and wouldn’t go beyond 70kW. Nobody on the charger, brand new car, optimum temperature. The day ESB are properly challenged on this island, the day charging will be taken seriously.
What was the SOC? Was your battery cold ?
ESB eCars at J14 on the M7 isn’t much better. Consistently poor DC charging speeds there. Usually chaos also due to the cables being too short.
