Electric car charging at the condo outlet: who pays?

It isn't a joint outlet. It's the one/set dedicated to his parking spot. The 'problem' is that those dedicated outlets aren't metered. He did suggest that he'd pay for all the power consumed in the building during the brief period he is charging his vehicle. I thought that was a reasonable alternative.

The province mandates the meters that are allowed to be used - so $3000 it is.

Stupid, and $3000.

That's definitely a piece of information that's missing. The guy says it's not much, about the same as a microwave. I didn't see any objective information about that, though.

Let me see if it's easy to google...

This seems to confirm that about a dollar a day is reasonable:

http://gm-volt.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-5610.html

A dollar a night (i.e. for a full charge) sounds very low, even allowing for reduced night rates assuming they have those in Canada; but let's take it as a given. The fair distribution of that charge seems methodologically analogous to fair utilization of parking spaces reserved for residents in front of residential buildings.

Some residents don't have cars, others don't like parking in front- but as long as those who do use the spaces stick to whatever time is prescribed (usually 20 minutes to one hour) there is no feeling that a common good is being abused. So, see if one or more outlets can be designated for charging car batteries (switch parking spots around if necessary) and set a time limit per car; any more can be done at the nearest garage.

And who's going to police that?

I don't see the problem with him using his designated outlet for this whatsoever. I think the condo association is being entirely unreasonable and it's quite stupid to go to court over this. They're going to lose.

I guess it would depend on the complex, for instance when I had my condo in CA the electric for the garages was paid through the HOA, they were detached garages. Of course every unit paid their own electric bill and had their own meters, not the garages, they were on the same outlet for the complex lights, outside lights, pool area etc.

My feeling is that electricity for charging a car is automotive fuel, not household electric service. It is a new charge, not an extention of existing utilities. Like someone mentioned, I'm not sure I believe it can be done for a dollar a night.

At the forum soz linked to, they talk about costs between $0.67 a night and $66 a month, depending on where the posters are located - and how much they need to recharge the vehicle. If it's daily local commuting (likely the case for someone who lives in a condo in Ottawa) - and the charging is done at night at a reduced rate, a dollar a night is possible.

The way you wade right into the middle of these things and blurt out the probable, common-sense outcome always makes me laugh!

I would really NOT make a very good lawyer. All this tedious discussion over a $40-66/month problem...

I guess that's why they pay you the big bucks...eh, Joe? (Is this keeping you up at night?)

As I said before, right now this is a theoretical problem only.

I didn't know that it only took about a dollar's worth of electricity to charge a car. On the other hand, we have a small building, and our common electric bills run only about $80-100 per month, so somebody adding $30 extra per month to charge his car would actually be a significant increase in our common electricity usage. I certainly wouldn't accept that as an acceptable charge to be borne equally by all the unit owners (unless all the other unit owners had electric cars too).

maybe he could take everyone for a ride once a month...

lol

Intuitively, I would have agreed with that. But when I ran a bottom-of-the envelope calculation to get a sense of the cost, it turned out to be plausible.

Let's say that this guy's car has a maximum power of 50 kilowatt, which is 65 horsepower. Let's say its motor operates, on average, at half its maximum power, or 25 kilowatt. Let's also say that it runs for a total of one hour a day, which is the length of a typical commute and back. That would mean the car uses 25 kW a day, which it has to 'refuel' overnight. In order for that to cost a dollar a day, the price of electricity would have to be four cents per kilowatt hour.

Is that plausible? I think it is. Googling around, I found this map for the average residential cost of electricity in the US, courtesy of a dude named Michael Bluejay. (Electricity prices in Canada shouldn't be outrageously different.)



As you see, the map shows that typical prices are about double what I just calculated. That's well within the range of plausibility if you account for possible overnight rebates, and for the general fudge factor of such bottom-of-the-envelope calculations. I believe that this one-dollar-a-night figure is probably true.

what's fair?

let him pay

[omsigdavid]So Stipulated.[/omsigdavid]

He's not asking for his gas to be paid. The deal seems to be that the condo owners share the electric bill.

This is no different than a condo owner who uses one or a few electric heaters to provide extra warmth within their own unit.

What of people who plug their block heaters in as soon as they get home from work, leaving them until they leave for work in the morning? Should there be a surcharge for that?

The condo association needs to look at this as more then a one-tenant problem. As electric cars and other alternative fuel/battery cars become more popular, they will have to find a way to provide access and resolve shared-costs problems for multiple tenants.

They're being rather short-sighted by focusing on how just this one instance affects the neighbors and the association.

After cross-checking with Sozobe's link, I noticed I forgot that hybrid cars generate only half their power through electricity. If you account for that half, the prices match almost exactly. No more need to account for any fudge factors, or even for overnight rebates.

Who gets charged now when a tenant needs to charge a dead battery in their gas-fueled car and plugs it into a portable battery charger for the night?

Access isn't a problem.

There are outlets at every parking spot in most condo projects here (and at hotels/motels/office complexes/some malls) - you need to be able to plug in the block heater/battery blanket on cold winter nights in places like Ottawa.

It would probably take a decent electrician less than an hour to rewire the outlet so that it powers from the apartment instead of the public line then there is no issue.