It makes sense that in case of solar, you pay transport cost both ways.
While it'd be a nice racket, I don't think that companies like UPS would get away with charging both the retailer and the purchaser for transport costs.
Buyer pays transport. Seller only gets the base price. For home installs, that means that the homeowner pays base+transport for any electricity he pulls from the grid, but the utility only pays base for any he puts onto the grid.
So I do have *some* sympathy for them. They should, at some point, be allowed to charge for the service of effectively storing your power for you...although we're not remotely close to that point right now.
Indeed, but I think that utility companies are some of the most forward thinking - looking 20 and 40 years ahead. And Hawaii has gotten to the point that some of their switching stations could see more power coming in than going out, so they've been having to modify things.
Hawaii is a special case though, so it's good to examine to help determine how things might go.
Because the size of lines needed increases with more power consumed, indeed, even as you need to buy more generation(for power companies that own their own), most power companies build at least some of their infrastructure cost into the per kwh charge, on the theory that if somebody consumes twice as much energy they should pay for needing, for example, a transformer with 1.5x the capacity that would otherwise be needed, some fraction of the extra power line, running a 72kV power line vs a 60kV, etc...
As for power wholesale versus retail, they should calculate your bill by net power units. If you provide 1000kWh and consume 1000kWh, they shouldn't charge you 1000x 12c and pay you 1000x 8c. You already pay about $60/mo for infrastructure ($30 of customer fees, plus infrastructure usage fees).
Keep in mind that people's electric bills can vary vastly on a charge basis. My static charges are only $40 here, and were even less at my last place.
It all depends on how you set your meter(s) up, but net metering on a monthly basis is the 'cheapest', you only need 1 dumb meter.
There are slightly more complex meters that will run different 'in' and 'out' meters depending on electricity flow. So, for your theoretical 1k kwh consuming house with exactly matching solar power production(on an average basis), you might get 300 kwh on both meters because the solar power feeds your house FIRST.
So you earn $24 for selling 300 kwh, pay $36 for buying power, plus the $60 fee, giving you a $72 bill for the month. BTW, is it possible that with such a large fee, especially with a static 'infrastructure' one of that size, that your utility is already 'bracing' for extensive adoptions of solar?
Generally you'll set up the meter(s) depending on the 'best' situation given your area. In some areas that might even mean having 'time of use' capable meters, so you're getting paid spot price. Which works out so long as daytime power averages more than nighttime.
This setup is excellent for using/storing solar power.
Indeed, it's good. But how do you propose for the power companies to pay the £425 million, in 1984 pounds, when they're facing declining revenues because people aren't buying their power anymore? (BTW, did you mean Dinorwig?)
If it shakes down that people can sell solar electricity for $.10/kwh, but have to buy electricity(solar and other) for $.20, then the power company has the resources to do things like build and operate more pumped storage stations. Don't forget that companies will build pumped storage where it makes the most sense - IE lowest cost for the power/energy, first. So if we need 100 Dinorwigs to meet demand, the last is going to cost a lot more than the first, because it'll require much more earth moving and construction.
Okay, I'm going to have to critique the article a bit. Please note that I live in Alaska and almost purchased solar panels myself - it's just that the distributor I looked at purchasing the panels from made break-even assumptions that not even I could swallow. It definitely doesn't make sense to pay somebody to install them up here.
Anyways - very first paragraph, 'ensure utility companies pay for unused power that is routed back into the power grid - a practice known as net metering'. To my knowledge ALL power companies are willing to pay for the power returned to the grid. However, they often want to pay utility rates for it, not retail. To put it another way, let's say you're a biodiesel producer in your spare time, and every so often you have some surplus. Do you expect the local biodiesel station to purchase your fuel* for the pump price? Or are they going to want to pay the price they get it from their distributor for?
Now, the actual situation is quite a bit more complicated- electricity isn't really stored, and the marginal cost per watt during peak times can be quite a bit higher than what you're charged as a home customer, without time cost considerations. Electricity costs tend to be a bit higher during the day, so the argument has been that panels tend to displace expensive power, not cheap power. But as market penetration increases, it can change the paradigm that utilities operate under, and unlike most industries, if it's doing it's job the power company IS looking 40 years ahead.
The argument is that grid-tie solar users are often close to even production, and due to net metering aren't paying the maintenance costs of the wire they're using, while still not being a significant contributor to the grid. They effectively use the grid as a giant battery.
So, while the answer for any given solar install is 'complex', on average net metering is a subsidy. Whether it's a worthy subsidy, that's up to individuals to decide.
The problem with rooftop solar being 'on par with prices for common fossil-fuel power generation in just two years' is that we may face a situation where power becomes MORE EXPENSIVE during the night(and late evenings when people are still up). Again, are we talking about utility, IE right at the plant, or retail, after it's traveled through potentially hundreds of miles of power line? Because the former is around $.02/kwh, the latter more like $.08. Browsing the citing document, not only are they using retail, but they're not predicting the price drop he predicts. They're predicting it'll drop below standard retail prices. Which includes grid maintenance.
Disconnecting from the grid is possible(in most areas), but it substantially increases costs to the solar installer to put in a battery bank and often even a generator. Operating the generator is obviously, much more expensive than buying power from the electric company.
If made into law, the Kansas legislation would allow utilities to pay solar customers using net metering less than the retail rate of electricity. In turn, utilities could use the excess electricity that customers were turning back to them and sell it at the retail rate.
So... Like how a regular business operates? I know, lose a little on each sale, but we'll make it up on volume!
Anyways, I support more solar power, but we have to realize that we'd see some drastic changes if it ever exceeds 20% of electricity generation here in the States. It's not anywhere near that yet, but like I said, the power companies are looking ahead. Heck, we might face a future where daytime power is much 'cheaper' than night time, and there's a big push for people to charge their vehicles at work. Of course, that means all those home panels will be producing electricity that has to transition the grid... Please note that I'm looking 10-20+ years into the future here.
As a bigger fan of electric vehicles, I can't help but imagine a system where 'retired' EV batteries are used to make homes, if not entirely self-sufficient, at least only really dependent upon a 'neighborhood grid'.
*Let's say you're good at it and it's identical to their normal product.
That rush is what junkies spend the rest of their lives chasing.
Normally the pain of being shot or otherwise injured negates that.
How about we go with the generally accepted option: 1. War sucked, the climate mostly sucked, the area sucked for US personnel, etc... Especially during Korea/Vietnam 2. Unlike WWII, heroin was readily, easily available. 3. Ergo, soldiers used often.
Dry them out from their chemical dependency and ship them home, where heroin is harder to get and life doesn't suck so much, and they don't feel the need to go back. Resulting in expected failure rates of 80% for ceasing use dropping down to over 80% staying off it for at least the period of the multi-year study.
One near-term solution is to stack memory (cache levels and main RAM) on the cpu chip. Memory doesn't produce that much heat so cooling would be straightforward. It would be a huge boost to speed to have memory right on top of the cpu. A few companies are working on this.
Another I've heard about is going vertical with the transistors. You still have increased worries about heat, but you can get a lot more density that way. Shorter average wire runs also result in less heat per transistor, on average, so increased density and efficiency might outweigh any need to throttle to manage heat.
No link, but I heard on NPR that back during the Korean/Vietnam war absolutely embarrassing numbers of troops were addicted to heroin.
The military tried an experiment- they dried them out and had them ride out the physical addiction over there in special centers BEFORE shipping them back to the states.
Their success, measured by how many soldiers(and ex-soldiers) fell back into addiction, was all out of line of the thinking of the time.
They came to the conclusion that a large part of the addiction must have been environmental - the sharp change between the war zone and the USA resulted in the vast majority of them NOT seeking out heroin.
Which is why many treatment centers talk about changing the environment to beat addiction.
By the way, I think the study isn't all that great - it only looks at the chance of death, not other possible long and short term negative effects from consumption. It's relatively easy to kill yourself by overdosing on Heroin, but from what I've read, if you can successfully ride that line(not difficult for a doctor), you can take it pretty much for life without other negative effects. You're addicted, but in about the same way a diabetic is addicted to insulin.
Not my experience. I put Apocalyptica in there and every other song was them(for that station). I ended up unclicking that station from my shuffle because I got sick of them. I mean, with 9 stations I don't need to be hearing them every 5th song.
A good CS program usually requires a good STEM course load.
I'm going for a CS degree right now, and it's very much STEM. Matter of fact, I'll graduate with an 'automatic' math minor with my degree program. Though I'm 'sneaking' out of taking chemistry because I have biology credits. No sneaking out of physics though.
No, I don't anticipate doing 'real science' in the course of my day to day life after graduation.
Personally, I'm chalking his statement up to some ignorance, which everybody has. Hopefully he'll become more educated from this.
But I suppose the charging station could have a transformer to kick the voltage way back up in order to get the power delivered through a cable that one person could actually pick up and connect.
Technology varies, but yeah, generally it's high voltage AC or DC that goes to the car.
That being said, because kV range voltage is 'interesting' whether AC or DC, there's some serious communication going on between the charger and the car before any real voltage starts transiting the charging cable.
Indeed, all this amounts to is a number of estimates on how much it'd cost to get ~ 160kW into a house, which would ultimately be decided by serious engineering work if/when it occurred. That's where they'd decide on the basis of all variables on what voltage at what amps to bring in, cabling, conduit vs buried cable, etc...
Personally, I think 800A@240 V is more likely, but other options include 3 phase, 600V, etc...
But if the transformer is close enough, sure, run a line from there.
You're right about the watts, but no so much about the amps. 800 amps would require ridiculously thick/stiff/heavy/expensive cable--completely impractical. What you'd actually need would be 2.5KV (or 25KV) service direct to the charger. And again, just curious, but I wonder what the cost would be...
You're 'mostly' right'. You can have an 800 amp 240V service, I even found a box for it here. It's 'only' 4 modern home's worth.
You'd end up running 3 sets of cable, from doing some internet searching. IE rather than the usual 2 wires, you'd be running SIX.
The trouble with running 2.5kV is that it'd 'probably' be even more expensive as the power company would have to run you a line from the 'nearest' 2.5kV transformer, plus, do they really want to be running that voltage through a residential zone? It'd have to be insulated.
As such, the cost would be so wildly variable that I can't even start to come up with a guess. You're probably looking at a hundred to two hundred a foot for the service run. Is that 100 feet or a mile?
Indeed, you want to see an area relatively devoid of charging stations?
Plug where I live in there - Fairbanks, AK. We have a total of ONE station. At the Nissan dealership.
As an oddity, we effectively have cripple charge capabilities all over the place, but that's because we live far enough north that gasoline vehicles need to be plugged in. Might only be 1500 watts, but it's still something.
The government of Shinjuku-ku will be surprised to discover they are not a city. Please feel free to let them know. I will look forward to my tax refund.
I didn't say that they aren't. As an American, I'm well aware of how cities can grow and envelope others, while retaining at least their technical authority. But peering in from the outside, just like I do with Denver, Boston, Chicago, Minneapolis, and various other cities, your city gets stuck into 'Tokyo' from an outsider's perspective.
To continue, it may be something of a translation issue. You're assigning '-ku' as 'city', where I might translate it as 'county, ward, precinct, or district'.
The fact remains that with about 11 km of driving you can reach many charging points. Whether those are technically within the bounds of Shinjuku is ultimately fairly useless. That leads to a question. For such a densely populated city occupying what's apparently a postage stamp's worth of land, how many gas stations are there?
Matter of fact, clicking on links around, I see at least 12 stations that identify themselves as Shinjuku.
Most people would have to haul that gasoline can in 4-5 times to avoid ONE fillup at the gas station. I have enough cans to fill my truck up(1 gal oil mix for chainsaw, 2 gallon for the mower, and 2 5 gallon cans, if you repurpose the kerosene one for gasoline), sort of.
Given that I know there's a number in town, I'd only count it as a 'gas station' if it has a large enough tank to realistically have fuel delivered by truck, with a dedicated pump & hose. IE starting at about 250 gallons, with most in the 500-1k range.
Because with a home charging station, you NEVER need to 'haul' electricity home.
And yet I live in Tokyo and I have never seen a charging point there.
First you say Tokyo, then you say Shinjuku. Make up your mind!
When I plug it into the application I get 452, I had to zoom in to be able to see Shinjuku, there were so many charging stations! Of course, it also implies that Shinjuku isn't really a city, more a section of Tokyo. But even restricting a circle to about 12 km, I get about a dozen stations, 4 of them Teslas.
Are you talking about having the equivalent of a Tesla Supercharger in the garage? Being able to fill up from 'empty' to 'full' in ~5-10 minutes?
1. You can't actually reach 5-10 minutes, the Lithium-Ion chemistry won't let you. You can get to 80% very quickly though. 2. The expensive part wouldn't be installing the supercharger, it'd be upgrading your home's service.
Current standard for a 'home' is 100-200 Amps@240V. That means they max out at 48kW. A supercharger is 120kW/160kw. You'd need an 800 Amp service to feed one of these and have enough left over to run the rest of your house.
Now, no prices are available, but from what I've seen, a cut down supercharger station should be available for a few grand.
If you're living in a mansion, you might have this, but even then you'll probably need your service upgraded.
Then they go home disappointed when they find out that you pulled a permit, had an electrician install it, and it was checked by a city inspector. The equipment itself is rated for the use involved.
Or for my house, only the last, and I know how to run electrical cable.
So, you need at least 30 times as many charging stations as gasoline pumps to support the same number of cars.
Consider that a home charging station can be on the order of a dryer(30A) or oven(50A) outlet, which will probably cost a couple hundred to install. Meanwhile a commercial gasoline is probably going to set you back $10k per fueling point and require regular maintenance.
There exist systems where you can install a cut-off device that turns power off during peak demand periods (popular for pool pumps and water heaters) where you can get a discount, the amount of which varies by utility company. I know because my grandparents had one.
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It makes sense that in case of solar, you pay transport cost both ways.
While it'd be a nice racket, I don't think that companies like UPS would get away with charging both the retailer and the purchaser for transport costs.
Buyer pays transport. Seller only gets the base price. For home installs, that means that the homeowner pays base+transport for any electricity he pulls from the grid, but the utility only pays base for any he puts onto the grid.
So I do have *some* sympathy for them. They should, at some point, be allowed to charge for the service of effectively storing your power for you...although we're not remotely close to that point right now.
Indeed, but I think that utility companies are some of the most forward thinking - looking 20 and 40 years ahead. And Hawaii has gotten to the point that some of their switching stations could see more power coming in than going out, so they've been having to modify things.
Hawaii is a special case though, so it's good to examine to help determine how things might go.
Because the size of lines needed increases with more power consumed, indeed, even as you need to buy more generation(for power companies that own their own), most power companies build at least some of their infrastructure cost into the per kwh charge, on the theory that if somebody consumes twice as much energy they should pay for needing, for example, a transformer with 1.5x the capacity that would otherwise be needed, some fraction of the extra power line, running a 72kV power line vs a 60kV, etc...
As for power wholesale versus retail, they should calculate your bill by net power units. If you provide 1000kWh and consume 1000kWh, they shouldn't charge you 1000x 12c and pay you 1000x 8c. You already pay about $60/mo for infrastructure ($30 of customer fees, plus infrastructure usage fees).
Keep in mind that people's electric bills can vary vastly on a charge basis. My static charges are only $40 here, and were even less at my last place.
It all depends on how you set your meter(s) up, but net metering on a monthly basis is the 'cheapest', you only need 1 dumb meter.
There are slightly more complex meters that will run different 'in' and 'out' meters depending on electricity flow. So, for your theoretical 1k kwh consuming house with exactly matching solar power production(on an average basis), you might get 300 kwh on both meters because the solar power feeds your house FIRST.
So you earn $24 for selling 300 kwh, pay $36 for buying power, plus the $60 fee, giving you a $72 bill for the month. BTW, is it possible that with such a large fee, especially with a static 'infrastructure' one of that size, that your utility is already 'bracing' for extensive adoptions of solar?
Generally you'll set up the meter(s) depending on the 'best' situation given your area. In some areas that might even mean having 'time of use' capable meters, so you're getting paid spot price. Which works out so long as daytime power averages more than nighttime.
This setup is excellent for using/storing solar power.
Indeed, it's good. But how do you propose for the power companies to pay the £425 million, in 1984 pounds, when they're facing declining revenues because people aren't buying their power anymore? (BTW, did you mean Dinorwig?)
If it shakes down that people can sell solar electricity for $.10/kwh, but have to buy electricity(solar and other) for $.20, then the power company has the resources to do things like build and operate more pumped storage stations. Don't forget that companies will build pumped storage where it makes the most sense - IE lowest cost for the power/energy, first. So if we need 100 Dinorwigs to meet demand, the last is going to cost a lot more than the first, because it'll require much more earth moving and construction.
Okay, I'm going to have to critique the article a bit. Please note that I live in Alaska and almost purchased solar panels myself - it's just that the distributor I looked at purchasing the panels from made break-even assumptions that not even I could swallow. It definitely doesn't make sense to pay somebody to install them up here.
Anyways - very first paragraph, 'ensure utility companies pay for unused power that is routed back into the power grid - a practice known as net metering'. To my knowledge ALL power companies are willing to pay for the power returned to the grid. However, they often want to pay utility rates for it, not retail. To put it another way, let's say you're a biodiesel producer in your spare time, and every so often you have some surplus. Do you expect the local biodiesel station to purchase your fuel* for the pump price? Or are they going to want to pay the price they get it from their distributor for?
Now, the actual situation is quite a bit more complicated- electricity isn't really stored, and the marginal cost per watt during peak times can be quite a bit higher than what you're charged as a home customer, without time cost considerations. Electricity costs tend to be a bit higher during the day, so the argument has been that panels tend to displace expensive power, not cheap power. But as market penetration increases, it can change the paradigm that utilities operate under, and unlike most industries, if it's doing it's job the power company IS looking 40 years ahead.
The argument is that grid-tie solar users are often close to even production, and due to net metering aren't paying the maintenance costs of the wire they're using, while still not being a significant contributor to the grid. They effectively use the grid as a giant battery.
So, while the answer for any given solar install is 'complex', on average net metering is a subsidy. Whether it's a worthy subsidy, that's up to individuals to decide.
The problem with rooftop solar being 'on par with prices for common fossil-fuel power generation in just two years' is that we may face a situation where power becomes MORE EXPENSIVE during the night(and late evenings when people are still up). Again, are we talking about utility, IE right at the plant, or retail, after it's traveled through potentially hundreds of miles of power line? Because the former is around $.02/kwh, the latter more like $.08. Browsing the citing document, not only are they using retail, but they're not predicting the price drop he predicts. They're predicting it'll drop below standard retail prices. Which includes grid maintenance.
Disconnecting from the grid is possible(in most areas), but it substantially increases costs to the solar installer to put in a battery bank and often even a generator. Operating the generator is obviously, much more expensive than buying power from the electric company.
If made into law, the Kansas legislation would allow utilities to pay solar customers using net metering less than the retail rate of electricity. In turn, utilities could use the excess electricity that customers were turning back to them and sell it at the retail rate.
So... Like how a regular business operates? I know, lose a little on each sale, but we'll make it up on volume!
Anyways, I support more solar power, but we have to realize that we'd see some drastic changes if it ever exceeds 20% of electricity generation here in the States. It's not anywhere near that yet, but like I said, the power companies are looking ahead. Heck, we might face a future where daytime power is much 'cheaper' than night time, and there's a big push for people to charge their vehicles at work. Of course, that means all those home panels will be producing electricity that has to transition the grid... Please note that I'm looking 10-20+ years into the future here.
As a bigger fan of electric vehicles, I can't help but imagine a system where 'retired' EV batteries are used to make homes, if not entirely self-sufficient, at least only really dependent upon a 'neighborhood grid'.
*Let's say you're good at it and it's identical to their normal product.
That rush is what junkies spend the rest of their lives chasing.
Normally the pain of being shot or otherwise injured negates that.
How about we go with the generally accepted option:
1. War sucked, the climate mostly sucked, the area sucked for US personnel, etc... Especially during Korea/Vietnam
2. Unlike WWII, heroin was readily, easily available.
3. Ergo, soldiers used often.
Dry them out from their chemical dependency and ship them home, where heroin is harder to get and life doesn't suck so much, and they don't feel the need to go back. Resulting in expected failure rates of 80% for ceasing use dropping down to over 80% staying off it for at least the period of the multi-year study.
One near-term solution is to stack memory (cache levels and main RAM) on the cpu chip. Memory doesn't produce that much heat so cooling would be straightforward. It would be a huge boost to speed to have memory right on top of the cpu. A few companies are working on this.
Another I've heard about is going vertical with the transistors. You still have increased worries about heat, but you can get a lot more density that way. Shorter average wire runs also result in less heat per transistor, on average, so increased density and efficiency might outweigh any need to throttle to manage heat.
No link, but I heard on NPR that back during the Korean/Vietnam war absolutely embarrassing numbers of troops were addicted to heroin.
The military tried an experiment- they dried them out and had them ride out the physical addiction over there in special centers BEFORE shipping them back to the states.
Their success, measured by how many soldiers(and ex-soldiers) fell back into addiction, was all out of line of the thinking of the time.
They came to the conclusion that a large part of the addiction must have been environmental - the sharp change between the war zone and the USA resulted in the vast majority of them NOT seeking out heroin.
Which is why many treatment centers talk about changing the environment to beat addiction.
By the way, I think the study isn't all that great - it only looks at the chance of death, not other possible long and short term negative effects from consumption. It's relatively easy to kill yourself by overdosing on Heroin, but from what I've read, if you can successfully ride that line(not difficult for a doctor), you can take it pretty much for life without other negative effects. You're addicted, but in about the same way a diabetic is addicted to insulin.
Hopefully more of the anti-drug warriors will start actually listening to this stuff.
Heroin isn't all that bad as long as it's medical quality and administered professionally.
Not my experience. I put Apocalyptica in there and every other song was them(for that station). I ended up unclicking that station from my shuffle because I got sick of them. I mean, with 9 stations I don't need to be hearing them every 5th song.
A good CS program usually requires a good STEM course load.
I'm going for a CS degree right now, and it's very much STEM. Matter of fact, I'll graduate with an 'automatic' math minor with my degree program. Though I'm 'sneaking' out of taking chemistry because I have biology credits. No sneaking out of physics though.
No, I don't anticipate doing 'real science' in the course of my day to day life after graduation.
Personally, I'm chalking his statement up to some ignorance, which everybody has. Hopefully he'll become more educated from this.
Excellent. Your property has caused injury to me and many others, now that the owner has been identified you can expect a class action lawsuit.
The problem would be that they'd simply change their patent holdings to shell companies. Each shell company would hold about 4 patents.
But I suppose the charging station could have a transformer to kick the voltage way back up in order to get the power delivered through a cable that one person could actually pick up and connect.
Technology varies, but yeah, generally it's high voltage AC or DC that goes to the car.
That being said, because kV range voltage is 'interesting' whether AC or DC, there's some serious communication going on between the charger and the car before any real voltage starts transiting the charging cable.
Indeed, all this amounts to is a number of estimates on how much it'd cost to get ~ 160kW into a house, which would ultimately be decided by serious engineering work if/when it occurred. That's where they'd decide on the basis of all variables on what voltage at what amps to bring in, cabling, conduit vs buried cable, etc...
Personally, I think 800A@240 V is more likely, but other options include 3 phase, 600V, etc...
But if the transformer is close enough, sure, run a line from there.
You're right about the watts, but no so much about the amps. 800 amps would require ridiculously thick/stiff/heavy/expensive cable--completely impractical. What you'd actually need would be 2.5KV (or 25KV) service direct to the charger. And again, just curious, but I wonder what the cost would be...
You're 'mostly' right'. You can have an 800 amp 240V service, I even found a box for it here. It's 'only' 4 modern home's worth.
You'd end up running 3 sets of cable, from doing some internet searching. IE rather than the usual 2 wires, you'd be running SIX.
The trouble with running 2.5kV is that it'd 'probably' be even more expensive as the power company would have to run you a line from the 'nearest' 2.5kV transformer, plus, do they really want to be running that voltage through a residential zone? It'd have to be insulated.
As such, the cost would be so wildly variable that I can't even start to come up with a guess. You're probably looking at a hundred to two hundred a foot for the service run. Is that 100 feet or a mile?
Indeed, you want to see an area relatively devoid of charging stations?
Plug where I live in there - Fairbanks, AK. We have a total of ONE station. At the Nissan dealership.
As an oddity, we effectively have cripple charge capabilities all over the place, but that's because we live far enough north that gasoline vehicles need to be plugged in. Might only be 1500 watts, but it's still something.
The government of Shinjuku-ku will be surprised to discover they are not a city. Please feel free to let them know. I will look forward to my tax refund.
I didn't say that they aren't. As an American, I'm well aware of how cities can grow and envelope others, while retaining at least their technical authority. But peering in from the outside, just like I do with Denver, Boston, Chicago, Minneapolis, and various other cities, your city gets stuck into 'Tokyo' from an outsider's perspective.
To continue, it may be something of a translation issue. You're assigning '-ku' as 'city', where I might translate it as 'county, ward, precinct, or district'.
The fact remains that with about 11 km of driving you can reach many charging points. Whether those are technically within the bounds of Shinjuku is ultimately fairly useless. That leads to a question. For such a densely populated city occupying what's apparently a postage stamp's worth of land, how many gas stations are there?
Matter of fact, clicking on links around, I see at least 12 stations that identify themselves as Shinjuku.
Stealth subs aren't a new idea
To some extent, all military subs have always been 'stealth'. That they need to make them stealthier is also nothing new.
Most people would have to haul that gasoline can in 4-5 times to avoid ONE fillup at the gas station. I have enough cans to fill my truck up(1 gal oil mix for chainsaw, 2 gallon for the mower, and 2 5 gallon cans, if you repurpose the kerosene one for gasoline), sort of.
Given that I know there's a number in town, I'd only count it as a 'gas station' if it has a large enough tank to realistically have fuel delivered by truck, with a dedicated pump & hose. IE starting at about 250 gallons, with most in the 500-1k range.
Because with a home charging station, you NEVER need to 'haul' electricity home.
And yet I live in Tokyo and I have never seen a charging point there.
First you say Tokyo, then you say Shinjuku. Make up your mind!
When I plug it into the application I get 452, I had to zoom in to be able to see Shinjuku, there were so many charging stations! Of course, it also implies that Shinjuku isn't really a city, more a section of Tokyo. But even restricting a circle to about 12 km, I get about a dozen stations, 4 of them Teslas.
enough wattage to "refill" at a comparable rate?
Are you talking about having the equivalent of a Tesla Supercharger in the garage? Being able to fill up from 'empty' to 'full' in ~5-10 minutes?
1. You can't actually reach 5-10 minutes, the Lithium-Ion chemistry won't let you. You can get to 80% very quickly though.
2. The expensive part wouldn't be installing the supercharger, it'd be upgrading your home's service.
Current standard for a 'home' is 100-200 Amps@240V. That means they max out at 48kW. A supercharger is 120kW/160kw. You'd need an 800 Amp service to feed one of these and have enough left over to run the rest of your house.
Now, no prices are available, but from what I've seen, a cut down supercharger station should be available for a few grand.
If you're living in a mansion, you might have this, but even then you'll probably need your service upgraded.
Then they go home disappointed when they find out that you pulled a permit, had an electrician install it, and it was checked by a city inspector. The equipment itself is rated for the use involved.
Or for my house, only the last, and I know how to run electrical cable.
So, you need at least 30 times as many charging stations as gasoline pumps to support the same number of cars.
Consider that a home charging station can be on the order of a dryer(30A) or oven(50A) outlet, which will probably cost a couple hundred to install. Meanwhile a commercial gasoline is probably going to set you back $10k per fueling point and require regular maintenance.
There exist systems where you can install a cut-off device that turns power off during peak demand periods (popular for pool pumps and water heaters) where you can get a discount, the amount of which varies by utility company. I know because my grandparents had one.
Some of these come with a sub-meter, some don't