While electric vehicles get a lot of hype in the U.S. and abroad, they remain very much a niche market. The Institute for Energy Research notes, “Despite exponential growth, with a record 2 million or so electric vehicle sold worldwide last year, only one in 250 cars on the road is electric. Only Norway, which has lavished subsidies and perks on electric vehicles because of their enormous oil and gas wealth, has an electric vehicle share of new car sales around 30 percent.
One of the obstacles in this country is the lack of a standard, nationwide, fast charging system. The IER analysis reports that over the U.S. holiday season, proprietary charging stations for Tesla EVs, the dominant U.S. brand, were inadequate. The Tesla Supercharger stations “were overcrowded over the holidays and many Tesla owners faced an hours-long wait to recharge their electric vehicles.” Charging a Tesla Model 3 at a Tesla Supercharger to 80% capacity takes over 50 minutes.
An electric charge was considerably less than a comparable fill up for a car powered by an internal combustion, fossil-fueled engine. The time required was far greater.
Facing the same problem, the European Union created what it thought would be an ideal solution. It blessed and financed a company called IONITY, based in Germany, which has rolled-out an EU-wide high-power charging network. The IONITY partners are BMW, Daimler, Ford, Hyundai, Kia, and VW Group (including Audi and Porsche). Their boast is “IONITY makes long distance travel with electric vehicles a European reality.”
It also turns out that IONITY is a classic cartel, and demonstrated that at 2020 dawned, by raising its charging prices by 500%, shifting from a fixed price to a pay/KWh system. Instead of charging customers about $8.87 for a charging session, the new pricing regime says consumers must pay 88 cents/KWh. So filling up with 80 KWh of power will run about $70 for 160 miles. Even considering the high European gasoline prices, that’s not a good deal.
Among the strongest negative reactions is Norway, which has some of the cheapest power in the EU and has the most enthusiastic purchasers of EVs (around 30% of new car sales). Norway believes its cheap hydropower should be reflected in IONITY’s pricing.
Could the EU model come to the U.S.? Democratic Reps. Andy Levin of Michigan (a scion of the Levin Michigan Democratic dynasty) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York this month introduced the “Electric Vehicle Freedom Act.” Electrek, an online EV news and advocacy publication, said the legislation “risks IONITY-style sticker shock in the U.S.” A key to the legislation is giving the Transportation and Energy Departments authority to set prices for charging EVs.
The bill would ban utility-owned networks, where state regulators could determine pricing, much as they set prices for residential services. The legislation also opens the way for federal financing of charging stations.
Electrek commented, “The notion of ‘charging as a service’ is, frankly, repulsive. Electricity is a commodity, and it would be nice to be able to procure it without entering an ongoing relationship with yet another subscription service.”
The online service added, “Europe has become a cautionary tale. The EU gave public funds to IONITY to build an EV charging network…After building the network, IONITY promptly increased its rates 500%, and pushed users to enter into subscription agreements with the company’s owners. There’s no reason to believe that the owners of America’s prominent EV charging networks, a mix of fossil fuel companies and private equity, will be any more considerate with public money.”
— Kennedy Maize