I’m a little irritated that the government didn’t step in and declare a standard before EV charging stations were built in the US. Charging stations are expensive, and they’re going to become increasingly important infrastructure. We want people to buy electric cars, but now the early adopters who didn’t buy a Tesla are being punished. This was NOT the time to adopt a “let the market decide” attitude.
This is upsetting since Tesla was going to adopt the CCS standard at their charging stations, since as far as I understand it, they were the only manufacturer with an unusual charging plug. Most everyone else was using CCS.
This announcement now means we’re farther away from a standard charging port, with Tesla, Ford, GM, and now Rivian adopting one set and others adopting another at the moment. I don’t care which one “wins” in the end or which is better, just pick one and be done with it.
I’d say it means that North America is finally moving to a single standard. All the other companies will get on board eventually. And the Tesla connector is better, so that’s just a bonus.
Been an interesting last couple weeks seeing automakers join the NACS party. Seems like slowly but surely they all will announce support at some point. Hoping Volvo/Polestar is next!
Having used both, while the market implications of NACS are still unclear it sure is the more ergonomic of the two standards. Those CCS2 DC connectors are just too large and unwieldy.
While I am not against it, I am sorry to see that it appears we are creating a de-facto charging monopoly. If Tesla opened the standard for 3rd party stations I would be all on board.
For what it’s worth, all of the technical specifications are open and published by Tesla. I believe they a design patent, but that they’ve committed to open use of it as with their other patents.
It’s this a good or bad thing?
I’d recommend watching Technology Connection’s take on it, as he was pretty outspoken against the Tesla plug a while back: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjny4u5THpU
I just think of it like everything transitioning to USB-C. It’s not good or bad really, it just is. Standardization in these types of situations is usually good but I’m sure some people will be upset that Tesla is involved.
