Unlike regular cars, EVs are powered by electricity, meaning they can be “refueled” right at home. In fact, 70 to 80% of electric vehicle charging occurs at home or in workplace parking lots. All electric cars come with a level-1 charging plug. This charger can be plugged into a standard outlet but will charge your EV at an incredibly low rate. On average, it will take 40 to 50 hours to charge an electric car using a level 1 charger.
Note that you will have to make sure that your home’s electric grid is up to the challenge of charging a car on top of the usual power demands. If you drive your car sporadically and for limited distances, you could make do with a level 1 charger. Mogile Technologies CEO Simon Quellette says your daily driving distance will determine if you need to upgrade to a level-2 charger. There may be little need for a level-2 charger if there are plenty of public chargers near your workplace or in your neighborhood.
But if you do want to upgrade to a level-2 charger, you will require either dedicated parking or a personal garage. Even better if your parking spot is right next to an existing power source. That’s not a necessity, however, because chargers with up to 25 feet of cable are available. EV Safe Charge founder and CEO Caradoc Ehrenhalt notes that you may not be able to install a home charger if you have a detached garage that is far from your house and is not connected to the grid.
You would have to connect the garage to the home’s electrical panel, an endeavor that may involve digging up part of the driveway to access the underground power cable. And even if your garage is attached to the home and connected to the grid, you may have to drill holes through the ceiling depending on the location of the electrical panel.
Now let’s talk about the elephant in the room: can your property’s electrical system handle the load of charging an electric car? You may need to consult a professional electrician to figure that out. Master electrician and Focus Trade Services owner Harvey Faulkner says that as a rule of thumb, electrical panels that don’t have space for additional breakers have to be upgraded to accommodate an EV.
So if your electrical panel does not have extra room for breakers, you will have to upgrade it before you can install a level-2 charger. Overall, Ehrenhalt says the average cost of installing a home charger ranges from $1,500 to $3,000. Expect these costs to increase significantly if the electrical panel or the amount of electricity supplied to your home needs to be upgraded.
As entities such as Kandi Technologies Group Inc. (NASDAQ: KNDI) bring more innovative battery pack systems onto the market, the need to frequently recharge an EV will reduce and the current demand for a lot more charging facilities will probably reduce as well.
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