[Dormant] Electric Vehicles

It’s like the digital TV transition: they decided to let industry decide. When they transitioned to ATSC the format allowed something stupid like 14 different resolutions and frame rates. In practice this meant Fox and ABC went with 720p60 while CBS and NBC went with 1080i30, but then their local affiliates could then choose what they wanted to do.

The Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) developed the J-1772 plug and then the CCS-1 standard to add support for DC fast charging. Tesla decided to make their own plug that is smaller because it can run AC or DC over the same pins, but it does use the same communication protocol as the SAE standard so they can use an adapter and also access CCS chargers. Tesla’s chargers integrated billing directly from the vehicle so its users would have the experience of just plugging in and leaving, then getting the bill later. Tesla has always offered access to its charging standard to other automakers, but it came with the poison pill of requiring them to agree to not sue each other for patent violations. Legacy automakers had a lot more patents to give up this way, so the offer was a non-starter with any manufacturer that mattered.

As part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the U.S. government was giving away grants to support construction of a lot more DC fast chargers, but specified that the chargers should allow credit card payments and support access for multiple brands of cars. While Tesla already had by far the largest charging network and its exclusive access was a selling point for their cars, they weren’t about to pass up free money to make it bigger. Suddenly they started adding credit card terminals to their new charger models and unveiled a “Magic Dock” version that could convert to CCS. At the same time they released a version of their charging format to become what they called the “North American Charging Standard” (which rankled some members of the SAE) and started negotiating with automakers to use their standard, presumably without the patent requirement. Eventually all the automakers signed on, the early adopters to give their customers access to the largest charging network, the late adopters because they were about to be left behind.

In the end, industry did coalesce on a single standard, but only because government funding was at stake. Meanwhile most cars produced before the 2025 model year suddenly had an outdated plug (including cars being built right now). The automakers that have adopted the NACS plug are making an adapter available for their older cars, but it sounded like some of the oldest models might be left behind. Also, anything that uses the Japanese CHAdeMO standard can’t be adapted, so cars like the Nissan Leaf are being left out.