One of the more amusing things I heard this week was from Anders Bell, the current head of engineering and technology at Volvo and former Tesla engineer, who described one of the new fast charging issues as “Hot Dog Anxiety.” This is a peculiar and also very European way to describe a very real phenomenon. Does Bojangles offer a solution?
I couldn’t possibly lead with Stellantis today because we had a lot of it yesterday, and it’s worth talking about why and what actually happened in this Morning Dump. There’s also some weirdness between North Carolina and Vietnamese automaker VinFast, which doesn’t seem to be particularly expedient in building a plant there.
And, finally, motorsports says goodbye to an absolute legend.
Charging Is Getting Faster, But Not Necessarily Cheaper
Shout out to TheSpaceCadet in our Discord for pointing out that fried chicken and breakfast joint Bojangles is joining other food purveyors in offering fast charging. The first one will be in my ancestral home of Savannah, Georgia. That’s fun. I like that. It did remind me of something that Volvo’s Anders Bell said when we chatted about the new Volvo EX60 earlier this week.
He said that people at the company were “continuously” having a debate over battery technology. After the failure of European battery startup Northvolt, he says they’ve become “cell omnivores” and will have a vertically integrated approach to battery manufacturing, but that the contents of the cell will just come from wherever makes the most sense. This is a strange quirk of the rollback of the Inflation Reduction Act. There’s less of a penalty for having a pack with Chinese-provided materials because there’s no tax credit to be excluded from (although it sounds like American EVs will be getting South Korean cells).
One penalty that isn’t going away, though, is what Bell called “Hog Dog Anxiety.”
“Hot Dog Anxiety is: You go in and buy your hot dog, and you’ve just been charged $25 [for fast charging] and it’s become an expensive hot dog,” Bell explained.
It’s a well understood fact that home charging is dramatically cheaper and more efficient than fast charging. There are many reasons for this, including the equipment cost of a Level 3 charging cabinet versus a Level 2 home plug. There’s also a lot of supply and demand here, as you’re probably charging your car at home overnight, when electricity is cheaper, versus in the middle of the day for fast charging on a road trip, when it tends to be more expensive.
Electricity costs have risen rapidly as demand on the grid has increased (and is projected to increase because of data centers), and the current administration has both increased the cost of energy through stoking a conflict in the Middle East and by actively discouraging sustainable sources. Right now the average electricity cost in kWh is about $0.194 per kWh, way up from $0.134 in 2020.
If you used a standard home charger on a 2022 Tesla Model Y Standard Range AWD to go from 20-80%, that’s roughly $8.18 for 159 miles of range. Not bad. That’s much cheaper than the average cost of 159 miles of range for a 30 MPG vehicle ($4.56 *5.3 gallons = $24.17). Even with gas prices at terrible highs, fast charging is expensive. At the Supercharger near me, in the middle of the day, it’s about $0.50 per kWh (cheaper at night). That same 153 miles takes about 19 minutes on a V2 Supercharger, which is pretty good, and it cost me about $21.53.
Right now, that’s a little cheaper than gas! But if/when gas prices come down, the math gets a little harder. There’s been so much talk about super fast charging–and it’s cool that even the cheapest P6 Electric EX60 can go from 10-90% in 16 minutes on a 350 kWh chager–I think the price gets overlooked.
This still means that buying an electric car isn’t necessarily cheaper if you can’t charge at home or work. When I’m on road trips in EVs I don’t know if I feel super worried about this, but if I normally charged at home it would suck to plug in for a top off, linger at the Sheetz as I decide whether I want a wrapz or a meltz, and then pay an extra $20 to charge.
[Ed Note: Charging big EVs on Superchargers can indeed be more expensive than driving even gas guzzlers. -DT].
Stellantis, Wow, Ok
Here’s what happened yesterday. I saw that Stellantis was doing its Investor Day and I was writing TMD and watching the live stream when I saw the above graphic. We were not invited to the event, presumably for reasons… and I just sort of assumed what they showed was all anyone would know.
Did we go a little crazy? We went a little crazy. [Ed Note: We reported the information we had, which was the chart above. Nothing crazy about that; just doing our jobs! -DT]. It was looking to be a slow day and I thought it would be fun to just write up what’s there, and the more we looked the more interesting stuff we found. No one told me that at lleast a handful of outlets would be there, in person, and that the company would show them models and full-sized styling bucks of a lot of the vehicles.
It sort of sucks, but it didn’t impact the coverage too much. One of the three guesses that David made about the Jeep Wrangler Scrambler was correct. Thomas had the Rampage and Dakota roughly correct. The company was fairly straightforward with the Chrysler Airflow and I think the Ramchager. By the time we wrote up the Dodge GLH we’d figured out what was going on and our reporting was pretty much the same. Poor Mercedes, I really set her up for failure, and the SRT Copperhead post is basically three posts as we quickly updated it.
For all of the talk about what’s there, I’m kind of interested in what isn’t. There wasn’t much discussion of Alfa Romeo and Fiat in the United States, even though both are technically still sold in the US. The Jeep Wagoneer S is skipping the 2026 MY, but I don’t see it here at all? I could definitely see the company abandoning the Wagoneer S in a couple of years.
North Carolina Is Maaaaaad At VinFast
Bojangles is very much a Carolina-based operation, as VinFast will be once it finishes building its plant there. Last I checked, the Vietnamese automaker was sstill intent on building a plant in Chatham County, North Carolina.
Per Bloomberg, maybe not…
North Carolina sued Vietnamese electric vehicle maker VinFast Auto Ltd., alleging the company breached agreements tied to a planned electric vehicle and battery manufacturing facility, and seeking to reclaim the project site.
The US state was exercising its contractual right to acquire the property to protect taxpayer investments after VinFast failed to meet key obligations tied to the project, Attorney General Jeff Jackson said in a statement.
“VinFast agreed to build a factory and create jobs for North Carolinians – it didn’t do either,” Jackson said. “When North Carolina makes a deal, we build in protection for taxpayers. VinFast broke the deal, so we’re using that protection to find a project for this site that will create jobs.”
VinFast is looking into it, according to the article.
RIP Kyle Busch
Kyle Busch, age 41, won his last race in the Craftsman Truck Series this weekend at Dover Motor Speedway. He gave an incredible interview with Amanda Busick, from FS1. She asked him “Why do these moments never get old” and he replied: “Because you never know when the last one is.”
Busch was hospitalized soon after and died, unexpectedly, as was announced by NASCAR yesterday:
Our entire NASCAR family is heartbroken by the loss of Kyle Busch. A future Hall of Famer, Kyle was a rare talent, one who comes along once in a generation. He was fierce, he was passionate, he was immensely skilled and he cared deeply about the sport and fans. Throughout a career that spanned more than two decades, Kyle set records in national series wins, won championships at NASCAR’s highest level and fostered the next generation of drivers as an owner in the Truck Series. His sharp wit and competitive spirit sparked a deep emotional connection with race fans of every age, creating the proud and loyal ‘Rowdy Nation.’ Our thoughts are with Samantha, Brexton and Lennix, Kyle and Samantha’s parents, Kurt and all of Kyle’s family, Richard and Judy Childress, everyone at Richard Childress Racing, his teammates, friends and fans. NASCAR lost a giant of the sport today, far too soon.
Our thoughts are with his friends and family.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
It’s Skin Cancer Awareness Month and our friends at XPEL are celebrating with National Don’t Fry Day, so I’m going to do a week of beach songs. We end the week with Karol G’s “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido.”
Observed annually on the Friday before Memorial Day, National Don’t Fry Day raises awareness about the dangers of ultraviolet (UV) radiation and promotes sun-safe habits as Americans head into summer. In recognition of the occasion, XPEL is offering 15% off automotive window tint installations at participating authorized dealers and company-owned stores across the U.S. on May 22 only.
The Big Question
Are you driving or going anywhere for Memorial Day weekend? How are you getting there?
Top graphic hot dog and car elements: DepositPhotos.com
RIP Rowdy. You were my favorite driver in the post-Gordon era.
It’s going to be rainy this weekend so I will probably stay home and relax after my road trip last week. Might go biking if it clears up long enough.
TBQ: Not much traveling but gonna go watch some local dirt track racing on Saturday night and then Sunday a friend is having people over for the Indy 500 and Coke 600 (go Katherine Legge!) so should be a great time. I still can’t believe Kyle has passed on though, the first ever NASCAR Cup race I attended was Gateway in 2023, which unfortunately ended up being Kyle’s last ever win in the Cup Series. I won’t lie I was never the biggest Kyle Busch fan but I respected the hell out of him, his personality, and the excitement that he brought to the sport. I was really rooting for him though when he was running pretty damn well these last couple weeks after a rough couple seasons and was also showing he could still be competitive and even dominant in the Truck Series. Also his Lucas Oil Chevrolet is one of my all time favorite schemes/livery’s in this Next-Gen Era and who could forget the legendary M&M’s Toyota. The sport truly did lose one of the greats, RIP Rowdy.
Was the REV also excluded from all the talk, or is it considered a trim of the Ram 1500 now? It’s not on the slides shown, unless I’m missing it
My travel plans are friend’s travel plans. My wife does animal rescue with foster dogs in our house. People that have adopted from us will board their dogs at our place, because their dogs know us and are comfortable with us. They tell friends who tell friends and…. My wife doesn’t know how to tell people “no” even with last minute “hey, a friend of a friend of a friend tells me you board dogs”.
So, I figure when I get home this evening, there will be 4-5 dogs I’ve never met in the house.
Which honestly, isn’t a bad way to spend a 3 day weekend, assuming everyone gets along. Like since Wednesday, we have a full grown (physically) Golden Retriever puppy (mentally) in the house. She’s so sweet and soft.. and stupid. Other than the serious risk of being bowled over, she’s wonderful to have around.
Hot dog anxiety? I had a hot dog for lunch today and I’m a little bit anxious about what it’s going to do to my gastrointestinal health.
Not driving anywhere for the holiday weekend. Too many people on the roads and in the parks. Great weekend to stay home and work in the yard or have a cookout.
I’m aware you have a musical theme for this week already, but I’m sad you didn’t pick the most obvious choice given today’s title.
My boss has informed me that we don’t get Memorial day weekend because we’re in Canada, so I guess I’ll just do some work in the garage. I’ll probably walk to get there.
I have a Tesla Model 3 LR and I do 110v charging at home overnight. It’s fine for my use. I do have an abandoned 220v outlet in my attic that I’ll eventually wire up for a L2.
I only do supercharging when going out of town.
Wouldn’t that 10~15% gain in charging efficiency by jumping to L2 have covered the cost of moving that outlet by now? Unless you have to pay for an electrician and it’s a lot longer/complicated logistical move… Heck, you could even leave the old 220V wire in place (disconnected from the panel obviously) and run new from the old breaker spot.
So far every EV driver I know avoids fast charging unless absolutely necessary. It’s the tax of convenience. That said it’s needed for road trips. Lots of advantages of driving an EV on a road trip. It’s quiet and smooth, especially in hilly terrain.
I’m doing a 150 mile round trip to a cottage with Seadoo in tow.
Yeah, I’m looking at the pricing for charging at home on Level 2 and thinking “the price of gas could drop down over 50% and I would still be significantly ahead for 90% of my driving.
I have a ’22 Kia Niro EV and my home electric bill has gone up about $50-$60 a month since I got my L2 charger (an Anker ‘portable’ L2 I bought off the manufacturer’s eBay site. I have no need for any connectivity in my charger, the car does it already). My previous ’18 Niro Hybrid would cost an extra $100-$150 at current gas prices, and it got 50MPG.
I’ve only used DC Fast Charging on road trips, and honestly 20-30 minutes at a Buc-ees isn’t a bad stop, and the rarity of those $20 ‘fill-ups’ is no deterrent to driving it.
in 3 years I’ve only charged at a DCFC a handful of times. I still have not used up my free 250 kWh promo at EA.
monthly electric bill for charging is only $20-30/month with 2 EVs
Yeah, I pay less than 10 cents per kWh at home. At work, it’s 15 cents. Anywhere else is at least double my home rate. Definite no-brainer to charge at home as much as possible.
Hot Dog Anxiety reminds me of the German saying that roughly translates to “Everything has an end, only a sausage has two”
I am going to the beach this weekend as well as the golf course. Fortunately, this requires maybe 8 miles of driving, depending on which course I play. I can ride my bike to the beach. Florida might be a bit of a punchline at times, but it has its upsides.
While I am not going anywhere this weekend, I have to drive ~900 miles for a work trip next week. I’m debating whether to take my diesel F250 or my new Wrangler. The F250 is quieter and far more comfortable (3/4 ton trucks are shockingly good road trip vehicles). Both get similar highway MPG (~23), but the Jeep would save $60 since gas is cheaper than diesel.
I thought I might regret trading in my Model 3 for the Wrangler given high gas prices, but so far I haven’t. The Jeep is more expensive to drive, but given the cost of fast charging, the difference in fuel costs is not nearly as huge as I expected. I find the Jeep far more fun and interesting than the Tesla, so the extra cost is worth it.
I probably will take the F250. I was informed that I will “only” be reimbursed $480 for mileage because airfare is cheaper than the standard mileage reimbursement (flying would add an extra day to the trip which I really can’t do), but that is still more than enough to pay for fuel for the trip and have money left over.
I just finished a 900 mile round trip to my son’s house yesterday in my 2002 S10, and it took just under 2 tanks each way. Cost was over $200. Gas in Tennessee was a bit cheaper than at home.
Hot dog envy?
I thought Europeans only ate clean and unadulterated food slowly. At least that’s what they tell us.
Anders Bell worked at Tesla prior to (and coming back to) Volvo.
So he’s likely trying to relate with Americanisms on why they don’t want to buy an EV.
So it really should be the Flat Pack Problem, when Europeans top off while picking up a bookcase at IKEA and end up with a bill bigger than their BILLY.
People just keep trying to slam the square peg of electric cars into the round hole in their brain about gas cars. They are fundamentally different and we spend far too much effort on improving fast charging when expanding “slow” charging for people in apartments and non-single-family housing would solve more problems and ease adoption.
Bingo, charging at home has got to be the most overlooked aspect of reluctance to switch to an EV out there, even if range anxiety/fast charging is a flashier set of issues.
Anecdotally – the people I know who’d switch to electric (myself included in this number) are the same people who are locked into renting/locked out of real estate that’d let them gain the benefit of charging at home. And an EV would save me, probably, thousands per year on a 80mi/day round trip vs. gasoline.
It would probably cost less to blanket an apartment complex parking lot with available L2 charging than it would to put in a single site of L3. And yet.
I don’t have an EV anymore, but I drove 100k+ miles on my Leaf and Tesla charging primarily with a standard 120 volt outlet.
I am still on my crusade to convince people a level 2 charging station is not necessary. As batteries have become larger and fast chargers have become more common, level 2 home charging stations have become even less necessary. It might take 40 hours to charge from 0-100%, but no one is actually doing that.
Yes, lots of people could get by with L1. I probably could with my Bolt. Since the factory EVSE supports 240 volts I plug that into a 240 and ta-da, 12A/240V level 2 charging at twice the speed.
I do the majority of my driving on electric and L1 has been great for my daily needs. I thought about installing a L2 charger, but it’s just not necessary for me.
Bingo. You been reading Abundance?
No, I don’t know what that is. Combination of lived experience and Technology Connection videos.
Yes! Technology Connections is amazing!
The residential building code in Quebec now requires that a cable be run to a location convenable for a EV charger that can handle Level 2 40 amp chargers & the room be left in the electric panel for the associated breaker.
This applies to apartments and multi unit condo building as well.
And it wouldn’t even take much to do. Look where apartments are. They aren’t 30 miles out of town in the middle of nowhere that require the occupants to drive 30 miles to get to a grocery store. Apartments are close to town with nearby places to eat, work and play and if you are near a major city, a mass transit hub (such as a subway station) to go further afield.
As such, I would guess that most apartment dwellers rarely drive much over 30 miles a day. Which can be recharged in 10 hours with a 110V socket.
If you have visited or lived far enough north, 110V sockets are common in the parking lots to run block heaters and battery warmers. My wife grew up in Northern Maine in a town that is one bad potato harvest away from the Great Depression. Tiny mom and pop stores that have been barely surviving for decades have outlets in the parking lot for block and battery heaters so that their customers can shop in mid-winter and still get their cars started. If these places can afford to wire a parking lot for 110V, then apartment complexes should be able to wire their parking lots for L1 Charging as well.
I 1000% agree with this as a person who can not home charge where I live!
I explain this to people all of the time at the car dealership. I just had a guy ask today “what do you do when you run out of battery?” and I asked “When was the last time you ran out of gas?”
Yeah, but I’m constantly told “I don’t want to have to sit around waiting for charging on the 600 mile road trip I take every Christmas!”
I feel like people weigh that super heavily, but then discount that the rest of the year they’d never be stopping at a gas station ever again. Like, 5 minutes said every week, to me, easily out weighs the one trip where you’d have to stop and charge for 40 minutes (each way).
Hot Dog related TMD on the same day as the Wienie 500! Coincidence?
(Starts at 2:00EST. Should be on the YooToob. If you didn’t catch it last year, you missed a really fun show!)
I watched last year and it was a blast.
But is hot dog anxiety a sandwich?
I’m going to leave work this afternoon and head home. I’m not leaving again until Tuesday morning unless I head to the local Marco’s .5 miles away for a pizza or calzone.
I thought hot dog anxiety was what some guys felt in the shower after gym class. Not me, though. Definitely not me.
I’m not sure that the Hot Dog Anxiety…analogy… thing… is a useful construct. Sometimes when I buy groceries, I also buy gas. It adds up to a more expensive day, sure. But I’m not blaming my tomatoes and Triscuits for the fact that I needed gas, or feeling that I was somehow bamboozled right there in that moment. (Let’s set aside all the big economic was we get had for sake of this comment.)
When I buy a (presumably) $10 sandwich at Jersey Mikes and it magically becomes $16 with tea and a tiny bag of chips? That’s frustrating, but not really anxiety, and is closer to what’s being described. I’m surprised and maybe even disappointed, but it’s more in myself for knowing how numbers can be added together before committing money them but not doing so.
tl;dr: Hot Dog Anxiety is a nothingburger
I feel like there has to be something lost in translation, at least culturally. I have never heard nor experienced Americans of any stripe conflate the expensive discrete costs of fueling (either dino juice or electrons) with a cheap snack for an overall expensive experience. Maybe Euros look at it differently?
I think the cost of convenience is at the heart of the analogy. You can buy a pack of hotdogs for $3 USD and some generic buns for $2 to cook your own hotdogs for about $1 each. But paying $5 for a single gas station hot dog just because you’re filling up is like throwing $4 away. Paying more for public fast charging is convenient, but not economical.
EVs for road trips don’t sound like the right choice. Hybrids or EREVs, even though they dip into fossil fuels, fit the need better. More cost efficient or less polluting? That’s another argument.
And I’ve already scaled back plans for summer roadtrips due to high gas prices.
Respectfully, I disagree. Bell specifically points out that the cost of charging (/fueling) has made it seem as if the hot dog is expensive, which strikes me as disingenuous, but not even that as much as plainly wrong, and not useful. Humans are capable of keeping two numbers, concepts, costs, separately and simultaneously in their heads. You might tell someone “I went out and ended up spending $100 and I only meant to get a hot dog!” But you don’t somehow come to believe that hot dog was $100, or feel anxiety about then being tricked into spending $100 for a hot dog, or every time you go out to get a hot dog, or…. What, exactly? The analogy (not really an analogy) doesn’t work. Fuel costs things. Goods cost things. We don’t necessarily or immediately conflate one for the other because they are incurred more or less contemporaneously.
All of the stuff about home charging rates and cost of convenience are Hardigree picking up a related but different thread about energy costs and running with it.
“Stellantis was doing its Investor Day”
–Matt Hardigree, not pictured above
COTD
Going to a state park 220 miles away with my friend and in my JKU.
No, I haven’t travelled for Memorial Day, 4th of July, or Labor day for more than a decade. Way to many people on the roads and at anyplace worth going.
I do have a float fishing trip planned for next weekend. We will be rolling in the ambulance and burning some $6 a gallon diesel. At least it gets 15 – 16 mpg.
From the headline, I was almost expecting it to be people whining over the Iacoccas not having chargers at their restaurants. But, it comes down to the same old thing: don’t buy a vehicle that plugs in unless you are able to conveniently charge it at home and/or work, otherwise, get a normal hybrid. Splurging on expensive fast charging is fine for the occasional road trip, but if that’s your primary plan for routinely topping up the battery, you really should reconsider
TBG, doing about 1,000 miles between today and Sunday for a music festival, then another 200 or so over Sunday/Monday for a family bbq
It sounds like EV owners shouldn’t watch the Weenie 500 this afternoon. Those are some awful big rolling hot dogs. Do bigger hot dogs cause more anxiety?
Dunno where I’m going this weekend, other than a fish fry 4 blocks away. Might visit the local museums or a retro game store or the Ben Franklin that just opened in town. Might also take a trip to some Route 66 attractions as well. It’s nice having a small car.
Also RIP Rowdy. Reminder not to push yourself through illness.
“Hot Dog Anxiety is: You go into Costco and buy your hot dog, and you’ve just been charged $2500 [for a 75″ tv] and it’s become an expensive hot dog,” an idiot explained.
Clearly it’s the hotdog’s fault.
Not the completely full Costco cart of cheeses, and grillables that you’re also going to pick up as you walk to the back to get a sample of caramel popcorn
The most expensive place to eat in the world is Costco. Walk in to get a $1.50 hot dog meal and come out with a SUV load of other crap you didn’t know you needed until you walked around to the food court.
Figuring an average combo price of between $3.99-$4.99 from a gas station or freestanding snack bar, how many Costco hot dogs per year would it take to amortize the membership fee?
I might go see Between The Buried And Me on Sunday, but otherwise zero travel plans
We pretty much only charge at home (currently ~$0.12 kWh here) . We’ve been doing level 2 in our garage for over three years. The few times I’ve looked at charging at fast chargers off the interstate, it’s been obvious at what a flipping rip off it is. (last week I put in $5 of level-3 to add a buffer for a 250 mile trip).
The problem is that pricing is now dynamic and at the whim of the provider and worst of all a total pain in the butt to compare pricing. Imagine if gas stations only put the price at the individual pump AND they could change the price whenever the hell they wanted AND you had no idea what it was gonna cost per gallon until you stopped your vehicle AND walked up to the pump. It’s almost that bad with level-3 EV charging; you need individual apps for every vendor and then maybe the price will match the app when you get there. Add in fees and the monthly subscriptions for the discount programs and it’s a mess. There’s no single app or map that shows accurate pricing.
Until there’s some type of pricing regulation and indication, it’s just a wild West when it comes to Level-3 pricing. (
Yes, I’ve been charge at home only for three years too. We’re at $0.15 a kwh but some months I have excess solar (yay). The one big trip I took with the electric resulted in paying $0.75 a kwh in the middle of Indiana. Took the cost efficiency down a bit! I don’t see regulation coming any time soon, no one feels sorry for electric car owners.
As far as the hot dog, we planned on a 40 minute stop. Bathroom, Subway sandwich, check messages, only had five minutes at the end when I was pacing around. But we had a plan.
I think this is rapidly going to become a rather large problem to EV adoption…charging will be fast, and people can charge from home, and their EV can go as far as their ICE car could. We’re really not far from where the difference is a matter of minutes, and very few people can actually fill their car with gas at home for less money, so EVs end up with a significant advantage.
At that point, the fractured charging market, the inconsistency, the differences in rates, the five different apps…that will be enough to turn people away from an EV.
The one big plus I can see here is that this could be a software change away from being much better. Really don’t need the chargers to change when it’s already possible for the car to direct you to a plug that’s available, fast, and with the right rate. Providers will have to align better if they can be excluded easily from the comfort of a driver’s seat before the driver even sees the charger.
I downloaded 5 apps just to try to compare prices at the different charging stations. The problem isn’t the lack of level-3 chargers on the interstates (figure there will be at least a few every 50 miles or so)… the problem is at what cost? Only the individual apps and the actual charger know for sure…
Some charge by the kWh,
Some charge by the minute.
Some require an app to pay,
Some you just swipe your CC.
Some have discounts if you subscribe,
Some have additional fees tacked-on,
Some have penalties if you stay past too long,
and almost all of them now have dynamic time-of-day / on-a-whim / congestion pricing.
The route planners show the locations, but usually not the prices, and if the prices are shown, they may not be accurate.
I didn’t want to pay a subscription for a one-time level-3 top off, so I wound up at a new, very fast Mercedes-Benz 4 post charge station in the parking lot of a steak house, not a dealer since the price was a little lower at 0.$50 kWh than the Flying-J nearby . I try to avoid giving any money to Musk (and without the $12/month subscription the Tesla chargers aren’t a better deal), so MB got my $5 for an extra 50 miles of range.
The route planners I’ve found don’t take pricing into account when picking charging spots.
You are correct that his can be fixed with software. There is already a plug and charge standard which gets around the whole hassle of having a half dozen or more apps. There are also apps or software in the car that plans trips, show the chargers to use, and show the price at that charger.
Then there was the federal push that is now dead to require all chargers to have a screen that shows the price and a tap or swipe to pay point of sale just like a gas pump.
Time of day pricing for charging is not a rip off – it is how electricity is priced. The charging company pays a whole lot more for a kWh of electricity at 6 pm than they do at 10 am or 10 pm. My home electricity pricing is the same with 3 prices based on time of day.
I don’t DC charge much but I have found apps give an accurate price that is the same as when I arrive. Just click on a couple of charging stations and compare – no different than gas buddy for gas stations.
That said – 95% or more of my charging is at home or at work because I can’t see paying $0.50 to $0.60 per kWh to fast charge when I can charge for $0.09 a kWh at home off-peak.
EV charging is regulated at the state level. Some require companies to charge per kWh, some by time, some allow either or both.
It all depends on how the EV charge company negotiated with the utility. Unless they open up their books you don’t know what the commercial price contract says. Most commercial billing includes both consumption (kWh) and demand (peak kW) rates with possible 2 or 3 tier pricing based on time of day. A commercial utility bill can be very complicated with the peak demand surcharge often being the variable that can costs the most.. Time of day wholesale electricity pricing it’s not absolute.
… but the issue to me isn’t the pricing; it the lack of comparison tools. There’s no signs on the highway showing the total cost kWh. EV charge. Stations just a couple of miles apart can be priced very differently, especially if one charges by $/kWh and another by $/minute, then there’s the discount if you subscribe monthly costs vs the amount of money saved over the course of a month.
Too freaking complicated to make an informed decision, and I think that’s all done on purpose. EV companies want you to subscribe to only their product and not use anyone else’s network.
The solution is publicly accessible real time total pricing in a unified format so one could compare the costs. We don’t have that now.