Automotive Engineering - August 2023 - 2

EDITORIAL
EDITORIAL
Bill Visnic
Editorial Director
Bill.Visnic@sae.org
EV charging is about more than a connector
It was impossible to miss in late May
what surely will be one of the year's
highest-profile electrification stories.
Ford, quickly followed by GM and
many others, announced they will
adopt the Tesla-developed " North
American Charging Standard " (NACS)
EV charging connector (see pg. 4).
The shift ostensibly displaces the SAE
International-developed Standard
J1772 " Combined Charging System "
(CCS) connector that has been the
predominant connector standard for
just about every EV that isn't a Tesla.
Although most who've handled both
connectors wouldn't argue the NACS
connector and its thinner cable generally
is more user-friendly, the more impactful
aspect of the connector transition " deal "
was that much of Tesla's vaunted
Supercharger public DC fast-charging
network - some 12,000 chargers at
2000 sites in North America - will be
available to non-Tesla EVs starting next
year. This was the Holy Grail for Ford,
GM and others anxious to reassure current
and future EV purchase " intenders, "
because the Supercharger network
is a model of ubiquity and reliability,
while the charging " experience " from all
the other public-charging providers
pretty much stinks.
But apart from that black-and-white
generalization, there's this: it's going to
take a lot more than a wieldier connector
to assure the kind of no-brainer
charging that's everyone's endgame.
The NACS connector isn't what makes
Superchargers great. It's thatTesla
sweated the details and laid down scads
of hard cash for proper site selection and
to dig trenches, lay cables, spec transformers
and the myriad hidden engineering
aspects that are table stakes for
a genuinely robust charging network.
I asked Christian Thiele, SAE's Director,
Global Ground Vehicle Standards, for
some perspective. " While the standardization
(J3400) of the NACS connector
is a positive step towards promoting
interoperable and reliable charging, it is
2 August 2023
only one piece of the EV charging puzzle, "
he asserted. " SAE efforts also support
the charging ecosystem by developing
standards for charging-station
communication protocol (J3068), security
requirements (J2954), and recommended
practices for the automatic
connection of EVs to charging stations
(J3105), as well as working with government
agencies to ensure adequate regulations
are in place. "
Thiele offers plenty to unpack, but
here's my takeaway: there's no substitute
for ecosystem and UX maturity,
such as comes from some of the " ancillary "
charging-related standards he
mentioned. From the start, Tesla conquered
payment bugaboos, with automatic
verification and billing when the
vehicle is plugged in. But remember that
Tesla has had to deal only with its own
vehicles using only its proprietary
Supercharger network. Other automakers
have promised plug-and-charge capability,
but the patchy interoperability
of disparate public charging networks
means that functionality is not assured.
Will the same thing be true of a
Supercharger network now open to
masses of other EV brands? Will
Superchargers' near-mythical robustness
be challenged by the increased
volume of non-Tesla EVs plugging in all
over? And equally important, will the
non-Tesla charging networks - EV
America and Chargepoint, for example
- really get any better just because
they're fitted with the NACS connector?
We quickly forget the multiple UX foibles
such as the rapid-fire generations of
credit card-processing interfaces at grocery
stories and gas stations. We now
have Apple Pay or swipe-and-go processing
that routinely make payment the
easiest part of a purchase decision.
It wasn't all that long ago gas stations
proudly proclaimed their new " Pay at
the Pump! " wizardry. Maybe we can be
just a little bit more patient with EV public
charging's progress?
Bill Visnic, Editorial Director
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Automotive Engineering - August 2023

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Automotive Engineering - August 2023
