How to charge an electric vehicle: exploring all available options.

By acquiring an electric vehicle, the delighted owner frees themselves from many troubles unique to internal combustion engines. Instead, they gain one significant concern: where and how to charge their electric car.

Read about the standards and capabilities of various types of charging stations in the article from RBC-Ukraine.

The article utilized materials from Autogeek and Bosch.

When searching for a place to recharge their "electric vehicle," the owner should consider three factors - two technical and one financial. This is what we will discuss today.

Charging Cable Standard (Connection Port)

You won't be able to charge the battery if the charging station's cable has a plug that differs from your standard. Or if the station lacks a socket compatible with the other end of your own cable. The connector format depends on two factors: the standard used by the car manufacturer and the power of the charging device.

For instance, one of the most popular electric cars in our region, the first-generation Nissan Leaf, featured a basic Type 1 (J1772) connector designed for stations with lower charging current, known as "slow" chargers. Additionally, the Leaf could be equipped with the older CHAdeMO connector as an option, which is suitable for powerful, so-called "fast" charging stations.

Today, the most common charging cable standard in Ukraine is Type 2 - a purely European standard, also for relatively low-power charging. However, Type 2 connectors often have (under a cover) extra contacts that convert Type 2 into CSS - the European connector for fast charging.

Electric vehicles manufactured specifically for the American or Chinese markets come with proprietary connector formats. Encountering these on Ukrainian charging stations is nearly impossible, thus owners of unofficially imported cars are often forced to retrofit them or purchase an adapter separately.

Station Power

The charging device's power determines how quickly it can charge your vehicle, given that there is a maximum power that the vehicle can accept at any given time.

Home Socket. The simplest charger, included with every electric vehicle, uses a home socket - a standard 220-volt household network. Under ideal conditions, it can handle a consumption current of no more than 16 amps. Thus, based on the Ohm's law studied in school, we calculate the maximum power of this mini-station to be approximately 3.3 kilowatts (220V x 16A = 3.52 kW minus conversion losses). With this power, a typical electric vehicle can be charged in 7 - 10 hours, depending on the capacity of its battery. For example, the Nissan Leaf varies in battery capacity from 24 to 62 kWh.

Fast Chargers. Most so-called public chargers in Ukraine offer fairly robust stationary devices with a power range of about 10 - 30 kW. Consequently, they can fully charge an electric vehicle relatively quickly - in 2 - 4 hours, again depending on the specific station's power and the electric vehicle's readiness to accept a high current.

Superfast Stations. The most powerful chargers, likely the dream of all battery-powered car owners, have a power range of 50 - 360 kilowatts. They can charge an electric vehicle in 20 - 40 minutes (of course, if the vehicle is designed for such current), but not to 100%, only up to 80% (to preserve the battery, the remaining 20% of capacity is filled with low current). There are very few such powerful stations in Ukraine; specifically, rbc.ua is aware of only two 360-kilowatt chargers.

Cost per Kilometer

Charging at home will be the cheapest option - provided you have purchased and installed your own charging station in your garage. Here, you will pay the regular household tariff without any surcharges, and a full battery will cost you around 100 - 150 UAH. If you haven't bought a special station, charging from a standard household socket will take much longer, but the cost will be about the same.

The most expensive electric vehicle kilometer in Ukraine is charged at fast stations with a power of 40 - 50 kW or more, as the connection is billed at no less than 5 UAH per minute.

However, most often, outside of their homes, Ukrainian electric vehicle owners charge at public level 2 charging stations, with a power of 10 - 30 kW. The tariff here is around 10-15 UAH per kilowatt.

In Brief

There are not many nuances regarding electric vehicle charging; any owner can quickly grasp them. The main issue is not the cable standard but the limited number of public charging stations in Ukraine - at least as of today. This primarily affects long-distance travel. Nevertheless, the existing networks of electric charging stations in the country are constantly working to increase the number of stations and improve their software.

As a reminder, recently RBC-Ukraine discussed what should not be done in an automatic vehicle.