My EV-olution
In 2011 Tesla was nowhere near as hot as it is today. In fact, very few people knew about the company. Once they learned about the product, the number one concern was range anxiety [1]. Range anxiety is the fear of running out of charge and ending up on the side of the road. I joined Tesla in April of 2011: I loved the vision, but admittedly, I secretly had some range anxiety too.
In May of 2012 I bought a Tesla Roadster. The company rewarded their employees by allowing priority access to a fleet of Roadsters, before opening it up the sale to the public. I loved my cool EV but, being conservative, I used regenerative breaking [2] more than acceleration. 2012 was a different EV world: no helpful tools such as supercharging, destination charging, trip planners, and the Model S data-dashboard (see picture 1 and 2.)
Picture 1 : Tesla Roadster energy display.
Source: https://ritchiesblog.wordpress.com/
Picture 2: Model S energy display
Source: Teslaratti.com
Today there are a variety of excellent tools addressing range anxiety, including half a dozen trip planners such as EV Journey, EVTripPlanner, EVTripping, ABetterRoutePlanners, and so on [3.] I had to figure out how to never run out of charge on my own but that intimidating challenge became a bright opportunity.
My EV Evolution:
At first, I approached my EV Roadster as any other car I owned previously. In 2012, that was a rookie mistake. Charging randomly during the day, analogous to filling up your gasoline vehicle, was a no go. Chargers were a sparse commodity. Charging took long.
Striving to improve, I started charging my Roadster at work. That too quickly grew harder as there were 2,400 of us on the road [4.] I finally figured it out: a decade ago, when a new cell phone user, I felt the same frustration until I started charging at night. I started treating my Tesla like a cell phone. I build a home charger and plugged in at night. I learned about settings and started charging after the peak rate. Voila! Treating my car like a cell phone solved all range issues.
Today charging and range are not a concern of mine. In only 5 years, the range of EVs has grown to record levels ([5], [6]), the vehicle energy consumption has improved, the charging network [7] has become a cozy safety blanket that will never let you down. The Roadster was cool but the Model S is truly incredible. My family added more Teslas to our EV fleet since and we have not been to the gas station in years.
My EV is a teacher:
But like a skilled teacher, my EV taught me more than I expected. As my EV vehicle became a major energy consumer at home, I started learning about energy cost, rates, the energy grid, energy sources. I started digging into a topic that was not top of mind before.
With time, I added more Solar so I can say that I drive on sunshine. I purchased a Power wall so I can do endless loads of toddler laundry and not worry about peak energy cost.
My current project is exploring the world of home energy management. What if I could run the household energy consumption from my cell phone? My priority is not elimination of mundane tasks (like making popcorn or turning down the thermostat) but reducing energy and cost.
The world of Home Energy Management:
CURB and Neurio appear to be the best but I am still in the due-diligence phase of this project.
I went from a range-anxiety and afraid to sell my backup gasoline vehicle to considering taking my house off the grid and running completely on alternative energy sources. I wonder what is going to happen in the next 5 years.
If you have easy or effective energy-saving tips please let me know! Always looking for an inspiration.
References:
[1] Range anxiety. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Range_anxiety
[2] Regen Breaking. Tesla. https://www.tesla.com/blog/magic-tesla-roadster-regenerative-braking
[3] Links to trip planners: EVJourney, EVTripPlanner, EVTripping, ABetterRoutePlanner.
[4] Roadster History. Business Insider. http://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-roadster-history-2016-3
[5] Tesla Quietly Introduces Longest-Range Electric Car on the Market. Fortune http://fortune.com/2017/01/22/tesla-long-range-electric-car/
[6] 400 miles Roadster. Fortune. http://fortune.com/2015/09/01/tesla-roadster-battery-upgrade/
[7] Charging map on July 17th, 2017.
6 comments on “My EV-olution”
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Boryana joined Tesla in 2011, at only ~600 employees, and helped the company through more than half a decade of hyper-growth. By early 2017 the company had grown over 5,000% and Boryana had built and led a number of teams such as People Analytics, HR Information Systems, HR Operation, Compensation, New Markets Readiness, Mergers and Acquisition Integration, and Business Operations.
Boryana was also the VP of Talent and Culture at Wikimedia, the foundation behind Wikipedia. At Wikimedia, Boryana oversaw all internal operations, people functions, workplace, and the team practices.
Following her passion of enabling and investing in human potential, Boryana also spends time as the Executive Director at the Straubel Foundation. The foundation's focus areas are sustainability, education and science.
A life-long learner and global nomad, Boryana has lived in Bulgaria, Germany, Austria, Russia, and the USA (since 2005.)
That is amazing how fast Tesla has expanded in the past 5 years. If you are curious about Tesla’s plans for future expansion in terms of supercharging stations, check out this link: http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/24/tesla-will-double-number-of-supercharger-stations-in-2017.html. It discusses Tesla’s ambitious plan to double its number of superchargers and the implications that has for its growing fleet and possible expansion into the semi market.
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Hi Issac, Thank you for your comment and cool article find. Indeed, incredible progress! @Ajit Punj posted a good blog this week (Smart Homes and Smart Energy.) He touched upon an important point: In order to allow more EVs and a more sustainable solution, long term, it would be best if households are set up to charge at home. It is critical that that happens. And, from my own experience, it also easy and less disruptive to your own daily life.
Interesting statistic from the Department of Energy: 80% of EV owners charge at home and “the cost to run your car over the course of a year can be less than running an air conditioner.” [1]
https://energy.gov/eere/electricvehicles/charging-home
MS&E 238A
Tesla’s growth is outstanding. It is amazing what kind of odds they were fighting against when they first started and continue to do so even today. There was definitely some negativity surrounding the ingenuity of EV and especially their range. In fact, Top Gear, a world-renowned auto show that reviews the brightest and newest vehicles in the market, once did a review of the Tesla Roadster back in the day. The car was however shown to lose power much before Tesla claimed it would. However, Elon Musk came out in an interview and said that Top Gear scripted the review and made it seem as if it ran out of power when the car’s data logs clearly showed it did not. (Interview Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QErBQWUQyEI)
Although this is an entertainment show after all, it does go to show what Tesla was up against. It was almost as if people, including experts in the field, were not ready for the reality of EV being a thing. Kudos to Tesla for powering through it and pioneering in the EV field!
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Abishek, you are so right…lots of skepticism but, interestingly enough the same public behavior was true when the first automobile was invented. There were also numerous fake car companies that made it harder for the real combustion engine producers to succeed. ” More than 500 automobile companies came in and went out in those first few years, you will better understand some of the forces working against those of us who were honestly trying to succeed. [1]” Sounds to me like the EV market today. 🙂
In response to your point, Tesla had to file a suit against Top Gear. Top Gear never fully admitted manufacturing the story [2] but at least the episode went away.
[1] http://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2017/01/09/archives/reprint/get-horse-americas-skepticism-toward-first-automobiles.html
[2] https://www.wired.com/2011/04/top-gear-responds-to-teslas-lawsuit/
Very insightful post, Boryana. I haven’t made the leap to EV honestly for the reasons you state. I wonder about driving 290 miles and being out of charge in rural OK, NM, etc. Driving on I-8 into SoCal through the desert in AZ/CA is concerning enough in a gasoline vehicle where there are no stations for 150 miles, cellular coverage is weak, traffic is sparse, and temperatures can be high, and that adds to the anxiety. But, as you note, the infrastructure has certainly changed a lot in the last decade, and many things are becoming much more common place than they were, making the transition easier as the anxiety reduces. Thank you!
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Children plus the heat on a long lonely highway is a scary combo. It’s what nightmares are made of. 🙂 On the other hand, we have one hybrid that we are keeping “just in case” but haven’t used the thing in 3 years :). The future is near!
http://www.fleetcarma.com/electric-car-end-range-anxiety/
https://nexusmedianews.com/the-end-of-range-anxiety-f6e26026c0dc