They're expanding their customer-base by maybe 2x or more. Those new customers will be be giving recurring payments to Tesla. For vehicles that Tesla didn't build. How is that not favourable?
I think they opened up the Supercharger network to ensure that the US didn't establish CCS as the standard and overtake Superchargers, such that Teslas have a competitive dis -advantage, but I don't think they're particularly thrilled to have all these other companies using their chargers.
People seem to think they're raking it in with the Superchargers, but distributing electricity is a low margin business. Same with gas stations where the money mostly comes from the convenience store part of it and such.
This is misleading and not entirely true.
Older Tesla chargers did not use CCS to communicate. My 2019 Model 3 doesn't support CCS at all. When I plug into a Supercharger, it's not using CCS to communicate with the charger, it's using Tesla's proprietary CAN bus protocol. Teslas made before 2021 need an ECU retrofit to support CCS.
So far, sure, but that can change. When most customers are non Teslas, it makes no sense to keep prices low.
Even when chargers become more common in cities, there will always be some places like smaller villages or long roads where you only have one option; that option possibly being a Tesla charger.
So even if it loses significance, the difference will still be there. And maybe it will be sufficient to retain Tesla being known for being cheaper long-term (because of charging).
Whether that's realistic: I don't know.
Sure, and that's exactly the case for gas stations today, and I'm sure the lone gas station on the long stretch of road has more pricing power than the one in the middle of a city with competition.
And yet gas stations don't charge based on what kind of car you drive. Tesla shouldn't be permitted to do so either, as this market develops more.
I could easily see EV charging stations approach the level of saturation of gas stations in the next 10 years.
Yes, today people are going to stop wherever there's a nearby charging station. But that's going to change, and fairly quickly.
Did they mean 17,800 supercharger units or 17,800 locations with super charger units. Because I've seen those numbers interchanged before.
The problem with chargers (and I say this as an EV owner) is that many people mostly charge at home, so they aren't using them even weekly. However, everyone goes for a road trip say around memorial day, and the EV chargers are PACKED. It is just a huge disparity between normal and peak usage. Or you go on a road trip and you need one in the middle of nowhere Idaho on the way from Seattle to Yellowstone.
Thankfully L3 charger units at least are cheaper to buy/install/maintain (in theory, if people didn't think the coords had copper worth scrapping) and can be installed in more locations than gas station pumps (like super market parking lots).
Given the disparity in peak usage, it makes sense, at least, to compete on availability rather than price, since even if you are paying $60 to charge up, it is only a few times a year. It is much more important that the chargers be where you need them, and to have free units when you need them, oh, and they should be working! ... than to be the cheapest price.
They mean 17,800 DC fast charging plugs open to GM cars (and say so in the article). Tesla has 2,397 DC fast charging sites (or stations) in the US and a total of 27,711 plugs.
I get a lot of gas in supermarket parking lots, several supermarket chains put gas stations in the parking lot of some stores.
If there are an average of 4 to 6 pumps per station, EV has a lot longer to go.