I was dismayed to read in the PT last week that Deni was expecting a ‘boom to tourism’ with the installation of this new ‘fast’ electric vehicle charger.
I appreciate most residents aren’t concerned about the details, or in fact EVs more generally, but believe that like me, in these financially pressured times, they are interested in council (and in this case also the state government) making wise investments with our money.
Somewhere along the line since the February PT announcement of “fast and reliable charging for residents and visitors passing through Deniliquin“, we have ended up with two 7kW AC chargers.
On the scale of charging speeds, they are slower than slow, a normal wall socket will even charge half that speed.
To help put this into context, most EVs now have batteries upwards of 70kW/h, so you’d need to park on Cressy Street for over five hours to even get a 50 per cent charge.
Whereas with all our surrounding towns Hay, Echuca, Moama, Jerilderie, Swan Hill, Kerang, Cohuna, etc all have had 50kW legitimately ‘fast’ chargers, operational for years.
A brief 40 minute stop for lunch in any of these towns would get you the same 50 per cent (~200km) charge.
Also at these parking bays, unlike Deni, you have the convenience of parking the reverse of your car near the charger (as charge points are commonly at the rear of vehicles).
Another big plus with these more powerful DC chargers you don’t need to buy and bring your own expensive array of charging cables.
If the council did the most basic Google search or spoke to even a single EV driver, they would have discovered EV drivers rely heavily on the car software to plan and navigate each road trip (it’s a necessity given the sparse network of charges). This five hour plus charging time would ensure Deniliquin would never feature on any route planner.
Why would any Victorians stop in Deni when their display tells them Moama has multiple 50kW chargers and at zero charging fee?
Granted, the installation of 7kW AC charging stations are significantly less involved and costly than 50kW DC systems, but you’d only need the one ‘fast’ charger to outlay nearly four times the charge of the two combined, and yes it would then ensure that EV tourists were actually brought into town instead of bypassed.
Failing the council not being able to afford or find suitable partners to install DC chargers, they would have been wise to wait and save the dollars they have spent and free up two prime parking spots that will rarely ever now be used.
A great initial headline, but resulting in a simple growth opportunity ineptly implemented.
Yours etc.
Rich Larcombe
Deniliquin