Ah, the power, the Raw POWER... er uh, yeah. There is no trick to this. We already know that power outlets are pretty much everywhere. If you can find a building with electricity, you've got power. But how many buildings offer access to a power outlet near a parking space? Not too many, at least not too many that haven't already designated that space for an electric vehicle.
There are several companies that began creating charge stations as early as 2009, for the debut of the Tesla Roadster. The company is called Coulomb Technologies. CT created the site called ChargePoint and began to churn out a standard, simple charge station. Now, five years later, there are thousands of these charge stations all over the world. And they all operate conveniently through a simple plastic card or an app on your smartphone.
The ChargePoint app can be installed on any smartphone and used to find all the public charge stations that are offered by CT. All these stations are connected to the ChargePoint network and will update on the app to let all the users know which stations are in use. You can either map to the charge station of your choice, or have the app just find the closest available station.
There are several other apps available for finding these. The following is a list of applications that I have downloaded and tested.
- EV Charging Locator
- CarStarions Charging Stations
- ChargePoint Find EV Charging
- PlugShare
All these apps will assist you in navigating to the station that you're seeking. For the most part they will provide some detail about the station as to the voltage / current levels that are available. The only trouble that they each seem to suffer from is pinpoint locations. You may find yourself searching a parking lot for several minutes before you find the station.
I hate to use a gas station as an example, but they're typically easy to find. A gas station is usually quite large, has a BIG sign with its logo, and has easy access to the street. There are often people going in and out of them regularly, unless the station is closed. EV charging stations are much smaller (even level 3). They're often not easy to spot or are inconveniently placed due to the misunderstanding of how they're to be used.
Apps
When I purchased the Smart ED, I got a recommendation from the salesman that I should use EV Charging Locator to find the charging stations. It is the most comprehensive app that I've found for charging stations. It's impressively easy to find a station using this app, the station icons aren't just one color and give some idea of whether they're being used or are out of service. Of the apps listed, this one is my favorite.
CarStations "Charging Stations" app is another that I downloaded and tested. It's very pretty. It is possible to leave comments, but one of the key things that I'd quite like is some indication prior to visiting a station, as to whether it is in use. The icons on the map offer nothing until selected. Of course like many mapping apps, you can get all the information after tapping the target, but with this app you only really get the address, type, and distance. For the most part this app is good if you know what you're getting into already, but for a novice, I would avoid it.
As noted above, the ChargePoint app will offer access to all its world wide charging stations. And as ChargePoint is the largest US provider of stations it is quite comprehensive. Immediately upon opening the app you will notice ChargePoint specific stations versus all others. The icons that represent ChargePoint will have a status built into the icon. You will know instantly whether a stations is available, being used, or out of service. Tapping any station will bring up the address, then drop you into a screen that gives the current status of that station. It's fairly comprehensive, but not at all conducive to use while driving.
Lastly, PlugShare. Plugshare is quite good for those who want to sociable. It was actually the first app that I installed to use before I purchase the Smart ED. It's helpful in that the icons are colored depending on the use status of the station. It also allows for private citizens to include their own home charger on the map. But the best feature that PlugShare offers is an photo database.
Although it is entirely possible to help re-position the icons on all the other apps so that the placement is ideal, you cannot add more than comments. PlugShare allows EV owners to add images to give others a much more clear idea of what to look for.
Tips
I like to make some final comments on using a charging station, that differ from something that may be more familiar (i.e. Gas Station Pumps) Consider the following...
- Is the station Public or Private?
- Some companies have had their stations added to the map by overzealous employees or random people. I've encountered at least one station that was not public, although listed as such.
- Is the station Free or Paid?
- Most stations are paid, but through ChargePoint it is possible to get free fuel. There are the occasional free stations, but they may not work.
- Is the station Functional?
- You may wrack you brain over this, remove the plug and re-connect, but still nothing. Sure it was a great parking spot, but now you have no power and have to go searching for another.
- Be sure to report this to the store or on the app of your choice.
- Take a picture with your camera phone, if you have one.
- Is the station Compatible?
- Not all stations have plugs that will work with your vehicle. Although there are a couple of standards, not all vehicles have all of them.
- J1772 is the most common, but the Nissan Leaf and Tesla S have a two different plugs that will not work for a vehicle like the Smart ED that only comes with J1772.
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