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Real EV Charging Rates from the Bay Area

So the 2005 Toyota Sienna needed to be replaced, and I got a 2017 Nissan Leaf. This particular model is an S trim (read cheap) in Red. So now that I’ve made the leap into electric vehicles, it is time to determine what the options for charging are. I’ve had the car for about 2 weeks as of this writing, so I am definitely not an expert. So there may be some inaccuracies in the information below.

Fortunately at work I have free EV charging, so knowing how the public charging works is part intellectual exercise, as well as a preventative in the case where I really need it. Right now I don’t have an EV charger at home (and neither do I have solar).

For reference, my Sienna would run at about 16 mpg, and I would get around 350 miles for a full tank of gas of around 18 gallons. So a full tank would be around $80. More on this later.

Charging in the South Bay area of Silicon Valley has a few options, with a charging option usually being within a few miles. The most popular options are Chargepoint, EVgo, and Volta. Some cities (eg: Palo Alto) and some stores (eg: Best Buy) have free charging (typically through Chargepoint). There are also some interesting charging deployments coming up through companies like Powerflex, where the Mountain View/Los Altos school district is deploying charging for school staff with discounted rates after hours for the public.

Different public companies have different ways of charging. Chargepoint is typically charged at a rate per hour, pro-rated against usage. EVgo charges per minute. Blink apparently charges per kWh for their chargers. I’ve had a quick play with charging at both Chargepoint and EVgo stations, so the following represents how I see charging working. The sample space is small (three charging sessions), but the numbers seem to reflect what I’ve been seeing implied with blogs.

So let’s start with Chargepoint. I’ve used Chargepoint at Best Buy, City of Sunnyvale, and Cupertino Rotary club. The Sunnyvale Best Buy charger was broken, the Chargepoint would detect and start, but would never deliver any power. It is marked as Free, so it might be a good option if it worked. It might be that the charger locking head was broken and so was unable to “lock”, and so would fail. Interestingly, Chargepoint didn’t notify that there was a problem.

The other times I’ve used Chargepoint it worked as expected. You swipe, plug in, and the charging starts. You go do what you need to do and come back, and be on your way. In both these cases, the systems where 6.6kW rated units. According to the Chargepoint app, one provided 6.0kW, the other 6.5kW. Since Chargepoint charges per hour (or part thereof), a poor charger choice could make quite a difference. In these two cases, I was there for just under an hour and had around 6kW added to the car. This is equivalent to about 20-24 miles. Not bad for around $1.50. Both City of Cupertino and City of Sunnyvale both charge $1.50/hr for charging.

Now EVgo is a bit different, they have DC chargers, capable of delivering about 40-50 kW. I charged for just under 8 minutes at an EVgo station, costing $2.10 (they round down, which is nice). They delivered 5.8kW of power in the 8 minutes.

DC chargers generally only deliver power to 80% of full, so there are some unusual behaviors that happen on the way to 80% that are actually quite important. In the case of EVgo, I was monitoring the power with the Leafspy Pro app on my phone as it was charging. The image below is a screenshot.

As you can see the initial charging power (green & blue line) was around 46kW for the first few minutes, and then began to drop off as the system approached 80% (red line). This is not unexpected, but it does have an impact on the overall power delivery for a session. The initial rate was 46 kWh, the final rate was around 41 kWh, and the average was around 43kWh.

The table below tabulates the costs as rates for the different charge rates that I used.

Type	Type	kWh	Cost	Time	Cost/kWh	Charge Rate
EVgo	DC	5.816	$2.10	8	$0.36	43.99
ChargePoint	Level 2	5.403	$1.37	54	$0.25	6.00
ChargePoint	Level 2	6.97	$1.59	64	$0.23	6.53

By comparison, the PG&E charge rate is $0.22 for Tier 1 or $0.27 Tier 2 for the base E-1 rate plan, or for my bill (which includes the Silicon Valley Clean Energy Electric option) it comes at around $0.21 or kWh. So with my current usage, the a good Chargepoint Level 2 charger will be cost equivalent to my plugging in at home with the E-1 rate sheet.

I’ve applied for the EV-A rate sheet from PG&E, even without the EV it would actually save me about $10 over the course of a year. With the EV-A rate sheet, PG&E provide Peak at $0.49, Part Peak at $0.27 and Off Peak at $0.13 during Summer. During winter, it is $0.34, $0.21, and $0.13 respectively.

The three options that I haven’t used yet are Blink (apparently $0.49/kWh for DC fast charging), Powerflex (apparently $0.15/kWh with a mix of DC and Level 2), and Volta (apparently Free).

So with the EV-A rate plan it is considerably cheaper to charge the car at home off-peak vs a public charger. Powerflex is not local to me, but intriguing and useful in a pinch, and Volta stations tend to be fairly busy (free of course is always in demand). Blink seems to have a charging model that would be a last resort.

With all the per hour charging systems, you really want to ensure you get the best bang for your buck, so you should make sure you know which chargers deliver the highest power. A good Level 2 can provide 6.6kW, but a poor one can deliver considerably less. Knowing the good Level 2 chargers can give you an effective 10% discount on pricing. With a DC charger, it looks like you want to do the same, knowing that the stakes are even higher.

Finally, public charge stations that charge per hour, really are intended to move you from empty up to something safer, but you shouldn’t expect that they should fill your car up. For DC, you definitely start getting power limited at around 65%, and with Level 2, I’d expect you can go higher, but you’d find the charge rate would begin to drop off for the final trickle charge.

If in the end, I don’t have charging at work, I’ll likely charge at home and be comfortable knowing that home charging provides very attractive pricing with the convenience of a full car first thing in the morning.

I’m likely to go Solar before the end of the federal tax credit, so then it will completely change the equation. I’m paying close to $2000/year for power, so with the new Tesla Solar pricing (around $8000 for a 4k unit), it will likely pay itself off within 5 years, even up front.

Planner Printable – Monthly Habit Tracker

One of my ongoing demons that I have always had to deal with is consistency in some tasks. Making consistent behaviors and habits is something that I have managed to make through most of my life in someways by the skin of my teeth – well maybe not that dramatic, but I generally do well under pressure and so procrastination works well for my type of personality where the time pressure focuses me. However, not avoiding the pressure comes from habits and predictability, and that is what this planner printable is intended to do.

This particular printable is a monthly habit tracker. The intent is to manage consistency and provide incrementable improvements over months. The main intent is to focus on a baseline habit with a bit of consistency, and then improve/balance over subsequent months.

To use this printable, name your tasks and your target (either per week or per month). Each of up to 31 days is included so you can mark off your task completion on a daily basis. At the end of the month, you can compare your target against your total. Your next month should ideally be modified by your relative success in delivering a particular frequency of the habit.

I find this structure useful because it will keep items that I need to do visible, and will allow me to see what different habits go well together, ideally simplifying the habits in to habit clusters.

Here is a PDF printable for A5 planners (or half Letter) – Monthly Habit Tracker.

Do you have any habit trackers that work for you, try this one out and provide suggestions on how this tracker can be improved.

Planner Printable – Full Year Calendar

As part of my new series of planner printables, I’m going through my set of custom planner pages that have worked for me, and some that haven’t worked too well. All these planners are designed to fit into either a half letter/statement/memo or an A5 planner. I personally use an A5 planner, and so these printables can be cut at the 5 1/2″ point.

This printable is a full year calendar, aligned for weekdays. This is designed to be inserted landscape in the planner, allowing easy lookup of where days in the calendar sit.

Here is a downloadable printable (Full Year Calendar) targetted for Letter only, please email for A5 size. Once print, you should be able to cut the page in half, add your hole punches and enjoy.

What printables are your favorites, any tweaks or changes you’d recommend to this one?

Moving to a Planner

Part of my 2016 ‘make myself better’ effort involved using a planner. There were a few reasons for an attempt to move back to pen and paper. It’s been over 18 months since I started with a Planner, and now is a time to share the pages I’ve created and the give an update on what works for me.

The first planner I purchased was a relatively cheap import from Amazon. Even though it was a relatively cheaply made planner, its leatherette feel was okay, and it has stood up to 18 months of regular use fairly well. For a pen for the planner, after playing with a few cheaper pens, I went for the (moderately) more expensive Cross Tech 3+. This is a nice two color (red/black) pen, with a mechanical pencil and a touch screen top. I’ve never had an issue with the pen and it holds really nicely.

For 2018, I’ve splurged on a Filofax Finsbury planner 81qldvqlmyl-_sl1500_ . This will allow me to split my day job from my personal/side projects into a different planner. I’ll still take both with me to work, but I’ll be able to pull out the appropriate one when needed. My first opinion on the Filofax Finsbury is that the pockets are nearly not as functional (pockets, etc) as my first cheap one. Since it is real leather, it will likely soften and become more convenient.

The form factor that I have a strong preference for is the A5 size. A5 (5.8 x 8.3 in) is almost the same size as Half Letter/Statement/Memo (5.5 x 8.5 in). So it allows me to use either formal A5 or generate cut a letter page in half. This has opened up a range of custom options that for generating pages. In coming posts, I’ll be highlighting those pages and making them available.

Translating an Ancestral Tablet

Some time ago in Toronto I purchased what I thought was an antique Chinese sign from an antique dealership. Once I had brought it home I did a bit more research on it and found that it is an old ancestral tablet.

This page covers provides some photos to provide an online reference to it and potentially bring some more information as it becomes available. I’ve also created a Quora question to see if the smarts of the Internet can help translate or otherwise provide deeper insight into the tablet.

The tablet itself is about 45″ (115 cm) tall – not including the base that would inserted into a stand or similar. The width is about 13.5″ (34 cm).

If anyone who comes across this page can help translate or provide more information, I’ll update the page.

Continue reading “Translating an Ancestral Tablet”

I’m on IPv6, are you?

After reconfiguring the lounge room to move the TV to another corner, I had to do a little bit of rewiring. As luck would have it, when I reset theResidential Gateway (RG) it didn’t come back. As part of replacing the RG, I though I’d dig a bit deeper into the getting IPV6.

So after:

Call out to ATT,
one missed appointment,
a visit from an ATT tech,
a new RG,
another visit from a tech,
a fixed outside line,
another call to ATT,
an email to customer service,
seven emails with customer service,
a new visit from a tech
a new RG

I am finally on the other internet.

Continue reading “I’m on IPv6, are you?”

Finally – a Granted Patent – US 8838868

After many months, and many years – I finally have a patent credited to my name. The patent is for an extension of the magnetic coupled connectors (such as magsafe connectors on Macs) to include diagnostic information through the magnets themselves. Of course watching how the sausage is made has been eye opening on a number of fronts. Read on for a quick review on the inspiration behind the patent and any interesting observations on how things went down.

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Gamifying the Workplace: Badges IRL with 3D Printing

We’ve seen badges and gamificiation appear in everything from a core business plan (Foursquare & Gowalla) to navigation apps (Waze). I’ve seen them on a user homepage at least two companies. It helps get people engaged by bringing together groups of common interest and drive involvement in tasks that they might not otherwise be involved in. You look up a colleagues and find they’ve done something similar to you.

The problem with the virtual badges is that they are too cheap to make (effectively free to create a new one) and only appear when you go to the employee’s homepage. Having played with 3d printing, I realized that you could make these badges in real life and bring a bit of physical interest to the work place, applying the same rules. With a few minutes on an online 3d modeling tool, online 3d printing services, and finally a magnet and some super glue, you can easily end up with full color sandstone badge.

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3D Printing Board Game Pieces

For Christmas I bought Robot Turtles for the family. It’s a great game, and very easily customizable for different skill levels.

Although the cards are nice, I thought it would be fun to to go from the card playing pieces to 3D printing from ShapeWays. I came across a turtle model on ShapeWays and contacted the designer asking if they could be extended to support the color schemes (and possibly the addition of lasers on the back. A few weeks later a TMNT variant of the turtles appear on his shop. Next ShapeWays purchase I included the little turtles in the request. Read on for pictures of the turtles.

Continue reading “3D Printing Board Game Pieces”

3D Printing Shelf Pegs [Updated]

Update: After Shapeways tweaked their pricing. I’ve moved over to selling them online at https://badgly.com/. I’m keeping them on Shapeways, but I have a lot more control on Badgly. Have a look there and feel free to use the 5OFF coupon code for 5% off.

When buying a house, you always find that there are some parts of the house that the previous owner had something installed, and the bag of spare parts and the supplier they used are lost to antiquity. This some times only gives you the option of replace, hack, or just live with it. This happened in the house we bought last year.

The shelves in the kitchen don’t have your standard Ikea style shelf pegs that hold the shelves up. Neither do they have the standard shelf pegs you can buy at home depot. These are custom jobs created by some unknown manufacturer. Not only are they non-standard pegs, but the holes they fit into are not only custom, they are a funky insert, twist and lock style.

After a discussion with a colleague at work I thought I’d 3D printing. After going through a bit of a process, I ended up ordering a set from shapeways.com. Here is the comparison of the original with the new.

Ultimately, I ended up with this shapeways part. I’ve included a rendering below.

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