
Canada Invests in Ontario’s Electric Vehicle Network - reddotX
https://www.canada.ca/en/natural-resources-canada/news/2020/02/canada-invests-in-ontarios-electric-vehicle-network.html
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clouddrover
This will be good additional charging infrastructure for Canada. More chargers
charging more EVs is good for everyone.

Petro-Canada has a trans-Canada CCS charging network already:
[https://www.petro-canada.ca/en/personal/fuel/ev-fast-
charge-...](https://www.petro-canada.ca/en/personal/fuel/ev-fast-charge-
network)

Electrify Canada is working on it: [https://www.electrify-canada.ca/locate-
charger](https://www.electrify-canada.ca/locate-charger)

~~~
yyy888sss
Looks like they both charge per min, not per kw/h. So you are at a
disadvantage with a slow charging car?

~~~
cmrdporcupine
From what I understand, there are energy regulator laws in various Canadian
provinces that have made it difficult to charge per kw/h.

Some combination of the two (time and energy) is ideal to prevent station
hogging, though.

~~~
OJFord
Surely households are billed by metered kWh?

> Some combination of the two (time and energy) is ideal to prevent station
> hogging, though.

That's a good point; in the extreme you wouldn't want someone sitting there
trickle charging for ages when already charged.

If it were up to me it'd be tiered like:

    
    
        t <=30min: £V / kWh
        30m < t <= 2h: £W / kWh
        2h < t <= 4h: £X / kWh
        4h < t <= 8h: £Y / kWh
        t >= 8h: £Z / kWh
     

where V < W < X < Y < Z, and probably per daily billing period rather than per
charge, to avoid cheating it by unplugging and re-plugging if you were nearby
at work or a motorway service station say.

~~~
cmrdporcupine
Utilities can do it, but not non-utilities like charging stations.

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martythemaniak
That's great. I wish the government would work with the provinces to
standardize and rationalize charging rates and prices.

Due to laws that prohibit reselling of electricity, getting charged by the
minute is the standard, yet, how much energy you're getting in that minute
varies wildly based on: whether the charger is shared, how cold it is, what
car you drive, which station you pulled into etc. Figuring out how much you
paid for a unit of energy is very hard and makes it almost impossible to
cross-shop.

Tesla gets partly around this by having a high-speed rate (~44 cents/minute >
60kWh, 22 < 60kWh), but it still makes it very hard to pull into a
supercharger and know how much your charge will cost.

At the end of the day, each charger should have a posted price of $/kWh. High-
speed chargers should charge more and you should be able to know what you'll
pay before you plug in somewhere.

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Jemm
Unfortunately the conservative Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford cancelled EV
rebates last year.

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cmdshiftf4
Pardon me for being cynical, but this feels like shallow tokenism to show how
"progressive" the liberal-minority federal government of Canada is, just as
most of their actions seem to be.

Canadians, especially those in densely populated cities with poor public
transit like Toronto and Vancouver, already struggle to _live_ day-to-day.
Where are they going to get the money for an electric vehicle when:

\- the average income in Ontario is $50-$60k (CAD), less than $4k per month
net

\- the rent on a one bed apartment is now averaging $2300

\- despite zero service improvements, the cost of transit continues to be put
up

\- groceries are now extremely expensive compared to US and EU

\- Internet, cellphones, etc. plans are more expensive than anywhere else

As a result, vast amounts of even "well paid" white collar workers can't live
in the cities and instead move hours away and are forced to drive essentially
everywhere, including into the cities for work.

30 years of stagnant incomes, increased taxes, soaring costs of living and
unapproachable costs of housing and the government makes a song and dance of
$8 million on EV chargers? Trudeau spent $600m keeping the fed-friendly media
afloat [0], has committed $1.4bn to foreign "women's health" [1] and more.

The friendliness of Canadians is echoed in their sheer complacency with
regards to their own governing. Whether it's a strength or a weakness is up to
the individual to decide.

[0][https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/ottawa-bolsters-
struggling-m...](https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/ottawa-bolsters-struggling-
media-with-600m-in-tax-measures-1.4186881)

[1][https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-trudeau-
ann...](https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-trudeau-announces-
billions-in-foreign-aid-for-maternal-and-child/)

~~~
fanatic2pope
Having lived through the years of federal Conservative fiscal mismanagement
under Harper and now (what feels like 100 years) under utterly incompetent and
blatantly corrupt provincial Conservative leadership here in Ontario I know I
am not alone in hoping for a much bigger change in the next election.

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ape4
Sadly the current Ontario government is against this kind of thing.

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sunkenvicar
Tesla and Volkswagen are already selling government subsidized electric cars
and installing government subsidized chargers. Now they get the chargers for
free. No one voted for this enormous wealth transfer from poor to rich. Nor a
car ban in under 20 years.

~~~
clouddrover
> _Now they get the chargers for free._

The car industry gets fuel stations and roads for free as well.

Charger costs will reduce. Battery based chargers will be a game changer for
infrastructure cost:

[https://www.engadget.com/2020/02/13/volkswagen-battery-
based...](https://www.engadget.com/2020/02/13/volkswagen-battery-based-ev-
charger/)

They can be installed anywhere with no need for big transformers or high power
cabling. And they offer some charging capability during power outages.

~~~
sunkenvicar
Gas stations are built without our tax dollars.

Imagine a future where we wait for our government-mandated chargers to charge.
Hopefully there’s an app for that.

If costs keep dropping, EVs will become a no-brainer for most. Scrap the
government incentives and we will achieve the inevitable.

~~~
clouddrover
> _Gas stations are built without our tax dollars_

Are they? They need fuel to sell. Where does that come from:
[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/15/climate-
change...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/15/climate-change-
canada-fossil-fuel-subsidies-carbon-trudeau)

> _Imagine a future where we wait for our government-mandated chargers to
> charge_

This is infrastructure building. Canada's got the right idea here. Build
roads, build chargers. Makes sense.

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breitling
You're comparing charging stations to gas. A more logical comparison would be
electricity in charging stations vs gas in gas stations.

~~~
clouddrover
It's all part of the same system. What use is a gas station without gasoline?

Do you want $3.3 billion going to fuel subsidies or do you want $8 million
going to EV chargers. If you're interested in a smaller government spend, you
want to pick the EV chargers.

~~~
zanybear
That’s what I though too. 8 million is peanuts for Canadian government. Even
for the provincial one. I think it’s more a PR move.

