ChargeNet's new 10-charger hub at Tauranga Crossing is billed as the country's largest. From left at today's opening: Richard Briggs (EECA partnerships manager), Steve West (ChargeNet cofounder), Julian McCree (ChargeNet board member).
ChargeNet's new 10-charger hub at Tauranga Crossing is billed as the country's largest. From left at today's opening: Richard Briggs (EECA partnerships manager), Steve West (ChargeNet cofounder), Julian McCree (ChargeNet board member).
THREE KEY FACTS:
ChargeNet has opened NZ’s largest EV charging station in Tauranga today - with rapid chargers that will deliver 400km of range in half an hour.
The firm - easily the largest player - wants to double its number of rapid charging points to 600 within three years.
Its chief executive wants details on Transport Minister Simeon Brown’s plan for 10,000 public chargers by 2030. She favours a model similar to the UFB, which saw the Government take an equity stake in Chorus and other network operators.
ChargeNet continues its rapid expansion. The privately-held firm opened a hub in Tauranga that can charge 10 EVs at once - which it bills as the country’s largest.
Early stations featured 25kW and 50kW chargers.
Chief executive Danusia Wypych says the new hub features 150kW and 300kW chargers.
The latter will give the average EV some 400km of range in half an hour, she says. (That might still sound slow to petrol vehicle owners, but it’s a leap on the 12 to 24 hours it takes to trickle-charge at home).
ChargeNet has more chargers than all of its rivals combined, Wypych told the Herald. The firm now has more than 300 rapid DC charge points and wants to double its network in the next three years, Wypych says.
ChargeNet's new 10-charger hub at Tauranga Crossing features 150kW and 300kW chargers.
Transport Minister Simeon Brown says the Government will help drive a push to 10,000 public chargers by 2030 - incentivising EV uptake by eliminating range anxiety.
Wypych supports the plan but adds, “We haven’t heard the details yet.”
ChargeNet CEO Danusia Wypych: Government should use UFB model for its 10,000 charger target.
The ChargeNet boss would like to see a model similar to that adopted by John Key’s Government for the Ultrafast Broadband (UFB) fibre rollout, which was co-funded by the Crown as it issued interest-free debt and took shareholdings in Chorus and other network operators.
“We think that was really effective in delivering NZ a world-class fibre network and we think it could be equally effective with EV chargers,” she says. Brown has been asked for comment.
Topping up: The average ChargeNet customer spends $20, the firm's CEO says.
“We are already well behind the pace and we need to catch up quickly. Our ratio of public chargers per EV is the lowest in the OECD,” Wypych says.
She sees a UFB-style arrangement as a vehicle for a catch-up. Utilisation rates at charging hubs could function as an equivalent metric to the number of households that had chosen to connect fibre, she says. Once it hit a certain level, the Crown’s investment could be bought out and the capital recycled.
What taxpayers chipped in
There’s already a public-private model in operation, albeit involving grants - and one that would need to be much upscaled and accelerated if were to be used as the vehicle to meet the 10,000 by the end-of-the-decade target.
Most public charges - including most on ChargeNet’s network - are already publicly subsidised by the Crown via the now nearly decade-old, contestable Low Emission Transport Fund, administered by the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA).
The firm currently has 116 50kW points, 20 150kW, 17 300kW. The balance of its chargers - 77 - are under 50kW. All can charge two or more vehicles at once.
EECA chipped in $786,000 for the new Tauranga hub and ChargeNet $1.8 million.
Wypych says the Crown agency’s contribution is typically 35% to 50% of a new site’s cost.
All up, there are 700 EECA co-funded public chargers in operation today (across all of the network operators), with another 1400 funded but yet to be built.
Since 2016, EECA has put $75.9m into the Low Emission Transport Fund, with $174m spent by applicants (most of the money has gone to chargers, but some of the funds have also gone to the likes of subsidising EVs for car-share operators and electric vans for supermarket deliveries).
While ChargeNet would like Brown to pull out his chequebook for a UFB-style programme, it’s reportedly also pursuing venture capital.
The Australian Financial Review reported in April that the firm had retained PwC to manage a $30m equity raise.
The firm wouldn’t comment then, or today, but records show no new investors have come onboard.
The majority of ChargeNet shares are still controlled by founder Steve West (best known as the co-founder of DJ software firm Serato, whose $116m sale to Japan’s Pioneer DJ was recently blocked by the Commerce Commission - denying major shareholder West an exit).
Wypych offered the general comment that, “A capital raise is always a part of a growing business, there’s still a huge role for private capital.”
Cheaper connections?
Like rival Jolt, which says the process of connecting to power networks is too costly and slow, ChargeNet wants changes “enabling investors in EV chargers to connect to the country’s 28 local electricity networks quickly and on effective terms”.
While the Transport Minister could not be immediately reached for comment today, he earlier told the Herald:
“Some of the main barriers to overcome to ensure more EV chargers are delivered are the high costs to connect to distribution networks, inconsistent processes for connecting to distribution networks, and gaining resource consents.
“Cabinet has agreed that these are regulatory issues that will need to be addressed and that the Government will work with EECA and the Electricity Authority to develop a more consistent approach to connection applications and pricing.
Transport Minister Simeon Brown says his 10,000 chargers by 2030 plan is aimed at neutralising "range anxiety". Photo / Mark Mitchell
“The Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment is working on amendments to the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Act 2000 to enable the regulation of smart devices, including EV chargers.”
Some pro-EV groups have called for smart home charger subsidies over public charger network grants. Smart chargers allow for faster home charging, and at off-peak times.
“A high proportion of EV charging takes place at home, and having this capability could shift demand away from network peaks,” he said.
“[But] the Government is not considering subsidies for home chargers as our priority is to ensure the development of a public charging network to overcome range anxiety which is a key barrier to people purchasing EVs.”
The everyday sums
Wypych says the average ChargeNet customer spends $20. The firm charges 40c to 80c per kilowatt hour, while power on home plan typically costs around 30c/kWh - which the chief executive says works out to around $14 for a full charge.
But Wypych says July registrations - out shortly - have ticked up, and that overall, electric vehicle says have reached a tipping point.
Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald’s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.
