Almost every new-age millennial carries a smartphone – be it for shopping online, reading e-books or surfing social media – but most importantly, to stay connected with the internet-driven world. This young cohort is intelligent, tech-savvy and always looks for quick solutions to every problem. Instant gratification could be a better term to define their way of life. For these individuals, being slow is certainly not a choice and devices that lack fast charging feature naturally doesn’t make sense.
This is why most youngsters go for devices that not only have smart offerings but also come with a fast-charging feature. This enables them to charge their devices in a jiffy and saves a lot of time, mainly during unplanned errands. The same technicality applies to an electric vehicle. Now let us come to the question that arises in most young minds: is it always considered “smart” to quickly charge a vehicle? If not, how about charging your EV the smarter way?
Let’s find out the difference between Fast Charge and Smart Charge.
Fast Charge is an advanced charging feature that enables the vehicle’s battery to accept more power than the standard inflow and charges the battery almost twice as fast as normal charging. Having this feature, a user can get rid of charging the vehicle overnight and rather do it anytime as per his convenience.
As the name goes by, it takes only about 15 minutes to 2 hours to refresh the battery life of an EV with fast charging and makes the vehicle ready to cover another long distance. However, the only catch with this type of charging is high costs. Usually, it involves higher equipment cost coupled with high-cost parking spaces, as compared to an AC charging system.
The fast-charging ecosystem is being developed for reducing the issue of range anxiety, which is one of the biggest challenges for Indian EV users and prevents them to adopt this innovation. Once implemented, it will allow users to charge their EV batteries much faster than usual, thus help them save a lot of time and troubles.
Smart charging, on the other hand, is an intelligent way of charging EVs. This type of charging ensures users to replenish their vehicles efficiently, based on the power capacity available on the site, thus saving users from the heavy costs of grid upgrades. Another way of charging the EV smartly is to do it slowly, mainly outside peak hours or during the night. Although it usually takes more time – around 8 hours or beyond – users or nature lovers in India context are going for it without second thoughts.
On an advanced level, smart EV charging can collect and leverage real-time data from users at the charging point. Considering various key factors such as local electricity consumption, fickle energy production, the number of other vehicles being currently charged, etc., a smart charging ecosystem can create a more sustainable energy environment. Registered EV users or those carrying RFID tags can just log in to the mobile application and start the charging process then and there. Later, they can make payments online or via plastic cards. All these features make smart charging safer, affordable and one that can save both, money and environment.
Both these features offer unique benefits to users. However, considering the negatives and positives, one can surely make the right choice.