"How much does it cost to charge mate?"
If we ever tell someone we drive an EV, literally the first question, every single time, is: "how much does it cost to charge though?".
I know it's all people want to know, and I know it's perfectly fine to ask, but it's so often now that I've had to build a little app to figure it out, because it's not a quick soundbite.
I'm convinced this is why people dislike EVs, it's not a simple answer.
Here's all the incredibly boring questions I have to go through in my head before my mouth opens:
- Public rapid charging? If so, what network, there are hundreds?
- Public charging on a medium-speed charger?
- Public charging on a slow charger?
- Home charging during peak tariff hours?
- Home charging during off-peak hours?
This is why my answer is always just:
"Cheaper than a diesel mate 😉"
I'm sure you've had this question if you're an EV driver, and I'm sure you even wonder yourself: how much is this rapid charger going to cost me right now?!
Well, here's a dumb little website I built to help:
Go here to use it 👉 ev-toolbox.vercel.app/cost/ (catchy URL, I know)
Stick in some details and it'll give you a cost for charging, it'll remember the previous values you put in too.
The math for it goes like this:
(batterySize - (currentCharge / 100) * batterySize) * (pencePerKwh / 100)
I'm looking at that thinking it could be even simpler, but there it is for now 😌
Bookmark the page and the next time someone asks you "how much does it cost to charge up your smug-mobile then?", you can be really amazingly cool and whip out a website to tell them, just like me 😅
If I were to answer all of those boring questions above about our particular car, here's how it'd break down with a 59kWh Nissan Leaf on 10% battery:
- Public rapid charging (~70p/kWh): £37.17
- Public slow / medium-speed charging (~30p/kWh): £15.93
- Home during peak hours: (30p/kWh 😭): £15.93
- Home during off-peak hours: (7p/kWh 🤙): £3.72
Basically, charging at home, during the night, is super cheap. 59kWh hours gets us about 220 miles, which is just laughable in comparison to diesel. That's 1.8p per mile!
Maybe I'll do a similar post about charging times soon, let's see if I've got the...time 😏