Path: ...!Xl.tags.giganews.com!local-1.nntp.ord.giganews.com!news.giganews.com.POSTED!not-for-mail NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 13 Jun 2024 00:20:39 +0000 From: BTR1701 Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv Subject: Yet Another Reason EVs are a Bad Choice MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=fixed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit User-Agent: Usenapp/0.92.2/l for MacOS Message-ID: <_NGdnQo7bcjKpvf7nZ2dnZfqn_SdnZ2d@giganews.com> Date: Thu, 13 Jun 2024 00:20:39 +0000 Lines: 79 X-Usenet-Provider: http://www.giganews.com X-Trace: sv3-bebgSmkXTDT/IZSJXDsW7Yqlr1td4fpOy0/qlRCUeISWYI8yNoC+yg5lysJHZTxNb/cMEIIR1w0o5xW!NCx2AaU9Edi6EbTIPz/TRRNO9+RrV0DOp9Iw8YmXL+flqbbteE9BKbIvyLMbux+s0YMEt7rX1tUh X-Complaints-To: abuse@giganews.com X-DMCA-Notifications: http://www.giganews.com/info/dmca.html X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly X-Postfilter: 1.3.40 Bytes: 5431 X-Original-Lines: 29 I've noticed that several of the EV charging stations at my local mall seem to have the cables ripped out. (There are also huge swaths of L.A. that are now dark at night because thieves have ripped apart streetlights to steal the copper inside.) So now even if you happen to find one of the rare chargers that can 'fuel-up' your EV, you're likely to find it useless due to thievery. ---------------------------------- DETROIT (AP) — Just before 2AM on a chilly April night in Seattle, a Chevrolet Silverado pickup stopped at an electric vehicle charging station on the edge of a shopping center parking lot. Two men, one with a light strapped to his head, got out. A security camera recorded them pulling out bolt cutters. One man snipped several charging cables; the other loaded them into the truck. In under 2½ minutes, they were gone. The scene that night has become part of a troubling pattern across the country: Thieves have been targeting EV charging stations, intent on stealing the cables, which contain copper wiring. The price of copper is near a record high on global markets, which means criminals stand to collect rising sums of cash from selling the material. The stolen cables often disable entire stations, forcing EV owners on the road to search desperately for a working charger. For the owners, the predicament can be exasperating and stressful. Broken-down chargers have emerged as the latest obstacle for U.S. automakers in their strenuous effort to convert more Americans to EVs despite widespread public anxiety about a scarcity of charging stations. About 4 in 10 U.S. adults say they believe EVs take too long to charge or don't know of any charging stations nearby. If even finding a charging station doesn't necessarily mean finding functioning cables, it becomes one more reason for skeptical buyers to stick with traditional gasoline-fueled or hybrid vehicles, at least for now. Two years ago, according to Electrify America, which runs the nation’s second-largest network of direct-current fast chargers, a cable might be cut perhaps every six months at one of its 968 charging stations, with 4,400 plugs nationwide. Through May this year, the figure reached 129-- four more than in all of 2023. At one Seattle station, cables were cut six times in the past year, said Anthony Lambkin, Electrify America's vice president of operations. "We're enabling people to get to work, to take their kids to school, get to medical appointments," Lambkin said. "So to have an entire station that's offline is pretty impactful to our customers." Until a month ago, police in Houston knew of no cable thefts. Then one was stolen from a charger at a gas station. The city has now recorded eight or nine such thefts, said Sgt. Robert Carson, who leads a police metal-theft unit. In one case, thieves swiped 18 of 19 cords at a Tesla station. That day, Carson visited the station to inspect the damage. In the first five minutes that he was there, Carson said, about 10 EVs that needed charging had to be turned away. In very large cities like Houston, charging stations typically contain an especially large number of plugs and cables, so thefts can be particularly damaging. "They're not just taking one," Carson said. "When they're hit, they're hit pretty hard." The charging companies say it’s become clear that the thieves are after the copper that the cables contain. In late May, copper hit a record high of nearly $5.20 a pound, a result, in part, of rising demand resulting from efforts to cut carbon emissions with EVs that use more copper wiring. The price is up about 25% from a year ago, and many analysts envision further increases. Charging companies say there isn’t actually very much copper in the cables, and what copper is there is difficult to extract. Carson estimates that criminals can get $15 to $20 per cable at a scrap yard. "They're not making a significant amount of money," he said. "They're not going to be sailing on a yacht anywhere." Still, the more cables the thieves can steal, the more they can cash in. At $20 a cable, 20 stolen cables could fetch $400. The problem for the charging companies is that it’s much costlier to replace cables. In Minneapolis, where cables have been clipped at city-owned charging stations, it costs about $1,000 to replace just one cable, said Joe Laurin, project manager in the Department of Public Works.