Koben Systems 11 Million EVCO Grant - Where will we see the chargers?

Soon after the the list of who received the EVCO grant money was released by the province of Ontario today, I reached out to Koben systems asking for comment on who their partners were, they promptly got back to me tonight and this is what we now know.

Koben Systems will be installing 193 Level 2 chargers and 144 Level 3 chargers across 193 locations. Those locations will be at the following partners:

- Tim Hortons

- McDonalds

- Impark (Parking Garages and Lots)

- Triovest (Property Management Company, some of their retail locations can be seen here which will be the most likely candidates)

- TRCA (Toronto and Region Conservation Authority, a list of parks under their control are here)

It looks like a promising group of potential locations!

BIG NEWS! - Ontario EVCO Grant Recipients Announced Today

Thats right! The recipients of the EVCO (Electric Vehicle Chargers Ontario Program) grants have been announced.

As it stands, Ontario can now expect to get 213 new Level 3 chargers and 280 Level 2 chargers. The 213 Level 3 chargers are a big deal as they are a gigantic improvement over Ontario's measly 4 chargers in place today as of writing this article. This is a huge leap forward in making long distance travel by EV in Ontario possible.

The list of recipients is below; you can fairly easily discern where the chargers will be located by the grant recipient name and high level of location column. Most are along major travel routes.

The largest recipient of all was Koben Systems Inc. receiving about 11 million of the 20 million avalaible to build out a "province wide network" of 193 level 2 chargers and 144 level 3 chargers.

Koben Systems is a leader in Canada in the build-out of EV charging infrastructure, but they are not a land owner so it remains to be seen where their chargers get placed. I reached out to them for comment on their build-out and location plan now that their receipt of the grant has been announced and they provided me with the following information you can read here.

Overall this is great news for the future of EVs and long distance EV travel in Ontario; however when you look at the list below, it is disappointing not to see a greater number of L2 applications for places like shopping centres and other public spots where EV owners might go and stay a few hours. The high visibility of chargers in these kinds of places will be one of the greatest determinators for the success of EVs in Ontario as they will be more visible to people going about their everyday business than just about anything else.

Many people will want to see charging options anywhere and everywhere before they consider making the jump to electric so look for future posts on the subject. The 280 announced today on top of current deployment is a good start, but it is a long road to ubiquity.

Here is the list of grant recipients:

Private/Public Sector Partners	Company Location	EVCO Funding	Number of Chargers	High Level Location of Chargers
Arntjen Solar North America Inc.	Woodstock, ON	$611,987	Level 2: 6 Level 3: 6	Central Southwestern Ontario
Best Western Stoneridge Inn & Conference Centre	London, ON	$65,630	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 1	Highway 401 near London
City of Kawartha Lakes	Lindsay, ON	$58,700	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 1	Lindsay
City of Vaughan	Vaughan, ON	$17,500	Level 2: 2 Level 3: 0	Vaughan
Corporation of the County of Prince Edward	Picton, ON	$75,000	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 1	Picton
Corporation of the County of Simcoe	Midhurst, ON	$267,350	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 3	Simcoe County, Barrie and Environs
Corporation of the County of Wellington	Guelph, ON	$215,076	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 3	Guelph and along Highway 6
CrossChasm Technologies Inc. (workplace)	Waterloo, ON	$61,088	Level 2: 6 Level 3: 0	Waterloo
Electric Circuit	Montreal, QC	$1,415,000	Level 2: 8 Level 3: 14	Ottawa and Eastern Ontario
Greater Toronto Airports Authority (Toronto Pearson)	Toronto, ON	$2,685,000	Level 2: 22 Level 3: 10	Mississauga
Icarus Power Generation	Toronto, ON	$341,932	Level 2: 4 Level 3: 4	Welland, Guelph, Tottenham, Keswick
IKEA Canada	Burlington, ON	$921,145	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 10	GTHA and Ottawa
Jag's Petro Canada Fuel and Convenience	Port Severn, ON	$130,000	Level 2: 1 Level 3: 1	Port Severn
JML Energy Solutions / JML Electric Inc.	Oakville, ON	$135,150	Level 2: 4 Level 3: 1	Toronto
Koben Systems Inc.	Mississauga, ON	$11,396,246	Level 2: 193 Level 3: 144	Province-wide Network
Oxford County	Woodstock, ON	$350,760	Level 2: 4 Level 3: 2	Ingersoll and Woodstock
Peterborough Distribution Inc. (PDI)	Peterborough, ON	$291,480	Level 2: 7 Level 3: 2	Peterborough
Precise Parklink	Toronto, ON	$81,660	Level 2: 10 Level 3: 0	401 near Downsview
Saugeen First Nation	Southampton, ON	$8,000	Level 2: 1 Level 3: 0	Base of Bruce Peninsula
The Corporation of the City of Brampton	Brampton, ON	$90,000	Level 2: 4 Level 3: 0	Brampton
The Tricar Group	London, ON	$32,747	Level 2: 6 Level 3: 0	London
Town of Amherstburg	Amherstburg, ON	$65,592	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 1	South of Windsor
Town of Caledon	Caledon, ON	$230,920	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 2	Northwestern GTHA
Town of Essex	Essex, ON	$252,820	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 4	Southeast of Windsor
Township of Russell	Embrun, ON	$9,429	Level 2: 2 Level 3: 0	Eastern Ontario
Best Western Hotel and Conference Centre - Oshawa	Oshawa, ON	$133,287	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 2	Oshawa
Triumph Inc.  (condo)	Toronto, ON	$56,500	Level 2: 0 Level 3: 1	Toronto
Total		$20,000,000	Level 2: 280 Level 3: 213

Read the press release from the province here.

Ontario is Lagging Behind on EV Purchase Consideration Statistics

A new study by Kanetix.ca has shown that nearly half of Canadians (48.7%) would consider an electric or hybrid car as their next vehicle.

That's a great number; but when broken out by province, Ontario falls short of where it should be considering the amazing level of EV support by the provincial government.

The number one province is Nova Scotia with a whopping 64.5% of respondents being likely to consider an electric vehicle, followed next by BC at 54.9%.

Ontario comes in at 45% (tied with Quebec), but what is alarming is that Nova Scotia has no rebate and the BC rebate is only up to $6000; far short of the previous Ontario max rebate of $8500 which has since been boosted to as much as $14,000. Basic logic would dictate that Ontario should be leading the pack.

Likely the disparity is somewhat cultural with Ontarians possibly being a little less likely to embrace the "eco" aspect of EVs and maybe a little more adverse to change and new technology. Unfortunately I am not a social scientist so I cannot say for sure, but what I can say is that we as EV owners and enthusiasts should do what we can to boost the numbers up a bit considering the great incentives our province provides.

You can:

- Bring up the topic with friends, family and co-workers who you know are considering a new car purchase. You may not want to come off as "preachy" but a lot of people may be the perfect fit for an EV and just never considered it. Also you don't need to own one to have the knowledge to steer people in the right direction. Go for some test drives yourself even if you have no intent of purchasing right now.

- If you own an EV, really give the people who stop you to ask you about your car the time to explain the car as best you can. Always bring up the incentives, it is amazing how many people have no clue as the government does not do a great job of advertising them.

- Share things on social media, if you have to suffer through pictures of your high school friend's new baby (I kid), they can manage a few EV positive articles popping up in their news feed.

- Push your employer and your local stores and malls to install charging. Seeing charging infrastructure go in gets people thinking about electric vehicles.

You can read the full Marketing Mag article here.

Fun Fact - Ontario Green Plates are Available in French

Not everyone knows this, but if you are one of the 550,000 Francophone Ontarians you can get your licence plates in the Province of Ontario in French with our French slogan "TANT A DECOUVRIR" instead of "YOURS TO DISCOVER".

Kind of cool right?

Well if you are a current or potential Francophone green vehicle owner, you will be happy to know that Green Plates are also available in French. I had never really thought about whether these existed or not, but yesterday in Richmond Hill I saw a Plug in Prius with a Green Plate that looked kind of odd.

Instead of starting out with "GV" for "Green Vehicle" the plate started with "VE" for "Véhicule écologique" and the slogan space was also occupied by "Véhicule écologique" instead of "Green Vehicle"

I looked it up and couldn't find any official information on the plates so now you know.

If you want to know more about the French language plates, the Ontario press release can be found here.

The Future of Ontario EV HOV Lane Access?

UPDATE: It turns out that as of March 9th, Ontario has put forth regulatory amendments to make HOV lane access by single drivers in PHEVs and BEVs permanent. You can read the proposal here.

However it is important to note this is still a proposal, we want this proposal to be put into effect and become law so it is still important at this point to speak up and make sure the Premier, Minister of Transportation and your local MPP hear your support to have this proposal put into effect making everything below still relevant.

_________________________________________________________________

HOV lane access by electric vehicles bearing "green" licence plates in Ontario is a perk I seldom take advantage of; but when I do, I really appreciate the time savings it grants me. For some people I imagine it as somewhat life changing, giving people back an incredible amount of time. Because of the value of time it is an excellent incentive to help aid in the adoption of zero emissions vehicles in the province.

Unfortunately access is set to expire on June 30th, 2016. It was already extended once as the previous expiry was set for the same date in 2015 but we are only about two and a half months away from the deadline this time and so far not a peep has been heard from the Provincial Government.

I did inquire at the Province's booth at the Canadian International Auto Show in Toronto this February and while I could not get any concrete information I was told that the expiry date was in discussion and it might either be extended again or simply made permanent. However with the clock ticking down I think it is important for EV owners and enthusiasts to speak up on our desire to at least extend, if not make permanent, HOV lane access for the following reasons:

1) It is a ZERO cost way to encourage EV adoption, all HOV lane signs are already marked with "GREEN Permitted" so there is no additional expenditure to continue allowing access.

2) Taking away access would incur some costs to change the signage on all Ontario HOV lane highways.

3) The HOV lane access programs in California and British Columbia are continuing. Taking away HOV lane access in Ontario would put us behind as an EV friendly Province/State and remove our leadership position on championing EV adoption.

4) Our HOV lanes in Ontario are not congested, in fact they are so empty that Ontario is now working to sell access to single drivers in regular ICE cars.

5) Ontario is nowhere near our EV adoption goal. The old goal was 10K vehicles by 2015 and I now belive it is now 1 in 20 by 2020 (5%) which works out to 409,626 electric cars by 2020. We are nowhere near this goal yet and we are probably sitting somewhere around 6K total (we were somewhere just under 5K in June of 2015.

So if you support continuing to allow access by single passenger EV drivers in Ontario to the HOV lanes, lets get vocal.

The most direct way is to email or mail your local MPP. Ontario does not exactly make it easy but the below can help you figure out who to write to:

You can look up your electoral district here

And then find the email and address of your MPP for your area here

Then email or mail them this form letter

If you are more of a social media type, I have already tweeted Cathleen Wynne and Steven Del Duca (Ontario Premier and the Minster of Transportation). Retweet my tweets below!

@Kathleen_Wynne Please extend HOV lane access to EV drivers past June 30th. Ontario is nowhere near its EV adoption goals.

— GT EVs (@GT_EVs) April 13, 2016

@StevenDelDuca Please extend HOV lane access to EV drivers past June 30th. Ontario is nowhere near its EV adoption goals.

— GT EVs (@GT_EVs) April 13, 2016

Hopefully we can put some pressure on the Government to not forget about this and extend the HOV lane access beyond June 30th.

My Go-To Argument for Electric Vehicles

Debating the merits of electric vehicles can be a tricky proposition, it can easily get heated or overly technical depending on who you are speaking with. Political beliefs and general miss-education on the subject can all get in the way and it is tough to bring out a universal argument for why electric (or at least zero-emission vehicles if you are a proponent of hydrogen) vehicles are the best option for our future and our planet.

I have found that the best universal argument comes from Arnold Schwarzenegger, here is the quote from him:

"There are two doors. Behind Door Number One is a completely sealed room, with a regular, gasoline-fueled car. Behind Door Number Two is an identical, completely sealed room, with an electric car. Both engines are running full blast.

I want you to pick a door to open, and enter the room and shut the door behind you. You have to stay in the room you choose for one hour. You cannot turn off the engine. You do not get a gas mask.
I’m guessing you chose the Door Number Two, with the electric car, right? Door number one is a fatal choice – who would ever want to breathe those fumes?

This is the choice the world is making right now."

Now some may still make the "long tailpipe" argument ignoring the greater efficiency of even the diriest coal electric plant over a regular internal combustion engine, for those I add my own extra line to the argument.

"There are two doors. Behind Door Number One is a completely sealed room, with a regular, gasoline-fueled car. Behind Door Number Two is an identical, completely sealed room, with an electric car, outside that room is a lit charcoal BBQ. Both engines are running full blast."

Adding those 8 words addresses the long tailpipe rebuttal as most electricity plants are not located in the downtown core and are rather located outside the city core and do not contribute to smog pollution to the degree that automobiles do.

From there you can launch into efficiency and renewable/clean energy mix in your respective area, but I think that small addition clears things up quite nicely.

Want to Understand Sustainable Energy and Electric Cars?

Then you need to read this article (link below).

Instead of trying to write it all out myself, I will just let Tim Urban of the blog - 'Wait But Why?' explain it to you. The piece is long to the point that it is practically a book but I have never seen a more concise explanation of why we need to achieve a sustainable energy future and the role that EVs will play in our sustainable energy future. He then explains the importance of a company like Tesla and really any car company working to put out a long range electric vehicle.

I highly recommend you invest the time.

How Tesla Will Change The World

I may one day write my own TLDR version of this with a Greater Toronto Area spin and focus on it, but for now nobody can explain it better than Tim.

While you are there, check out some of his other work, you may just find yourself hooked. But don't forget to come back over to GTEVs. I am planning on my next posts to start addressing the state of charging in the Toronto are and provide some tools to rally around the cause of installing chargers and hopefully influence some change in the city.

Introduction + Why start this blog?

My name is Dylan, I am an EV (Electric Vehicle) owner, Tesla Model 3 reservation holder and something of an EV and sustainable energy enthusiast and activist living in the Greater Toronto Area.

I have quietly and religiously been following electric vehicles for nearly 10 years since the Chevrolet Volt concept was first shown at NAIAS and not so quietly talking the ear off of anyone who would listen to me extol the virtues of electric vehicles. I have long had the idea of doing my own writing on the topic of EVs, but never found the right motivation to do so until a few days ago.

Hot on the heels of the Tesla Model 3 unveil on March 31st, Breakfast Television ran a small segment on the reservations numbers and the car in general, I watched the segment generally hoping for a positive piece that would drive some EV interest in the GTA; unfortunately that was not the case.

Well, OK, it generally was positive; up until Frank and Winston started talking about "concerns" around the Model 3, namely with charging. Not only was it riddled with inaccuracies they showed this image to convey the lack of chargers in the GTA:

Now I will be the first person to tell you that the state of charging options in Toronto and Ontario in general is dismal at best. But Frank had made a comment along the lines of that he (and I am paraphrasing slightly here) 'had a hard enough time waiting to fill up his car at a gas station, much less waiting 3-4 hours at a charger and finding something to do'.

That is when the above image from Tesla's website came out to back up Frank's issue with Electric vehicles. Unfortunately they neglected a few important facts:

1) Yes, your at home charge might take a while, but it will normally be overnight and every single morning you will leave with a "full tank" so to speak. That "full tank" will let you drive 350km that day and as the majority of people do not drive more than that in a day and also most likely won't crack even 100km in an average day of driving. So in reality, you will never visit one of these destination chargers or super chargers in a Model 3 unless you go on a trip which leads to fact #2.

2) Winston correctly pointed it out that there was only one supercharger in Toronto, which is correct. However the spin they were putting on it made it seem like people were going to have to use it as their one and only gas station in Toronto when in reality, Superchargers are for long distance travel enabling you to hop from charger to charger stopping once every 2-3 hours or so. Had they zoomed out a bit they would have seen this:

Which clearly paints a different picture; a picture that shows you can use Superchargers to get to many of North America's major cities as the network was intended to allow. In fact you can probably get to the majority of North American cities by the end of this year as the below picture is the build-out plan to the end of 2016.

Paints a much more positive picture than trying to imply all owners are going to be trying to "fill" their cars at a single super charger station in Toronto doesn't it?


3) Lastly, they stated that there are very few "destination" chargers only in the downtown core of Toronto. True if you use only Tesla's site to find chargers with a Tesla plug, but a simple adapter can allow you to use almost all the chargers in the GTA. The below screenshot from Plug Share clearly shows that they are not just located in the downtown core.

All in all I was disappointed with the segment and I realized that as EV's take root in Toronto as the Bolt and Model 3 come to market, there should be a GTA-centric resource for everything EVs and so GT EVs is born. 

I hope that the segment aired the way it did simply due to a lack of education on electric cars in the newsroom and not out of malice. I tweeted some corrections to them immediately after the segment aired and offered to speak with them if they wanted to speak to a current EV owner and expert on the topic, but as of writing this blog I have not had a response.  

Should you want to watch the segment you can find it here