Re: Yet Another Reason EVs are a Bad Choice

On Jun 13, 2024 at 2:16:20 PM PDT, "Rhino" <no_offline_contact@example.com>
wrote:

On Thu, 13 Jun 2024 00:20:39 +0000
BTR1701 <atropos@mac.com> wrote:
 

 I've noticed that several of the EV charging stations at my local
 mall seem to have the cables ripped out. (There are also huge swaths
 of L.A. that are now dark at night because thieves have ripped apart
 streetlights to steal the copper inside.) So now even if you happen
 to find one of the rare chargers that can 'fuel-up' your EV, you're
 likely to find it useless due to thievery.
 
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 DETROIT (AP) — Just before 2AM on a chilly April night in Seattle, a
 Chevrolet Silverado pickup stopped at an electric vehicle charging
 station on the edge of a shopping center parking lot. Two men, one
 with a light strapped to his head, got out. A security camera
 recorded them pulling out bolt cutters. One man snipped several
 charging cables; the other loaded them into the truck. In under 2½
 minutes, they were gone.
 
 The scene that night has become part of a troubling pattern across the
 country: Thieves have been targeting EV charging stations, intent on
 stealing the cables, which contain copper wiring. The price of copper
 is near a record high on global markets, which means criminals stand
 to collect rising sums of cash from selling the material.
 
 The stolen cables often disable entire stations, forcing EV owners on
 the road to search desperately for a working charger. For the owners,
 the predicament can be exasperating and stressful.
 
 Broken-down chargers have emerged as the latest obstacle for U.S.
 automakers in their strenuous effort to convert more Americans to EVs
 despite widespread public anxiety about a scarcity of charging
 stations. About 4 in 10 U.S. adults say they believe EVs take too
 long to charge or don't know of any charging stations nearby.
 
 If even finding a charging station doesn't necessarily mean finding
 functioning cables, it becomes one more reason for skeptical buyers
 to stick with traditional gasoline-fueled or hybrid vehicles, at
 least for now.
 
 Two years ago, according to Electrify America, which runs the nation’s
 second-largest network of direct-current fast chargers, a cable might
 be cut perhaps every six months at one of its 968 charging stations,
 with 4,400 plugs nationwide. Through May this year, the figure
 reached 129-- four more than in all of 2023. At one Seattle station,
 cables were cut six times in the past year, said Anthony Lambkin,
 Electrify America's vice president of operations.
 
 "We're enabling people to get to work, to take their kids to school,
 get to medical appointments," Lambkin said. "So to have an entire
 station that's offline is pretty impactful to our customers."
 
 Until a month ago, police in Houston knew of no cable thefts. Then
 one was stolen from a charger at a gas station. The city has now
 recorded eight or nine such thefts, said Sgt. Robert Carson, who
 leads a police metal-theft unit.
 
 In one case, thieves swiped 18 of 19 cords at a Tesla station. That
 day, Carson visited the station to inspect the damage. In the first
 five minutes that he was there, Carson said, about 10 EVs that needed
 charging had to be turned away. In very large cities like Houston,
 charging stations typically contain an especially large number of
 plugs and cables, so thefts can be particularly damaging. "They're
 not just taking one," Carson said. "When they're hit, they're hit
 pretty hard."
 
 The charging companies say it’s become clear that the thieves are
 after the copper that the cables contain. In late May, copper hit a
 record high of nearly $5.20 a pound, a result, in part, of rising
 demand resulting from efforts to cut carbon emissions with EVs that
 use more copper wiring. The price is up about 25% from a year ago,
 and many analysts envision further increases.
 
 Charging companies say there isn’t actually very much copper in the
 cables, and what copper is there is difficult to extract. Carson
 estimates that criminals can get $15 to $20 per cable at a scrap
 yard. "They're not making a significant amount of money," he said.
 "They're not going to be sailing on a yacht anywhere."
 
 Still, the more cables the thieves can steal, the more they can cash
 in. At $20 a cable, 20 stolen cables could fetch $400.
 
 The problem for the charging companies is that it’s much costlier to
 replace cables. In Minneapolis, where cables have been clipped at
 city-owned charging stations, it costs about $1,000 to replace just
 one cable, said Joe Laurin, project manager in the Department of
 Public Works.
 
 

 
I can think of several solutions to this problem, though some would
require some research:
1. Find a material to use that isn't copper but works well enough.
(That's the one that requires research.)
2. Wrap the cables in metal cladding to make it harder to cut. That's
been done for years.
3. Instead of providing a cable at the charging station, let the car
owner provide it; the charger would only contain a port/receptacle for
the cable. Initially, the cable could be kept in the trunk like booster
cables but eventually the engineers would figure out a more elegant way
to keep it hidden away and just pull out of the car somehow.

Then you're just going to have thieves breaking into cars and stealing their
cables the same way they're vandalizing gas-powered cars for their catalytic
converters.

 
4. Figure out how to charge wirelessly. I can charge my phone
wirelessly by just laying it on the charging station. (Doing the
same for a car might require some research.)
5. Secure the facility so that only EV owners with a key card can
enter. That would make it harder for the thieves to do their thieving.