Electrek reports that Elon Musk will be adding CCS connectors to its Supercharger stations network in the United States to let non-Tesla EV owners, including Lucid Air EVs, access the extensive charging network.
One of the largest concerns non-Tesla owners have is not being able to find a working public charging station when they travel. Electrify America comes with 3 years free for Lucid Air buyers but it is often not easy to find an available or working Electrify America charger. A recent study showed that 23% of chargers are simply broken and do not work. Whereas the Tesla Supercharger network is much more built out.
Some of the Tesla Superchargers in Europe have added these CCS connectors and it will come to the United States as well. The rollout has been slow to added CCS connectors and adapters in Europe, we expect the same in the US.
“In North America, Tesla uses its own proprietary connector on both its vehicles and its Supercharger stations. This approach prevents non-Tesla EV owners from using the Supercharger network and limits Tesla owners to the Supercharger network for fast-charging unless they can get their hands on a CHAdeMO or CCS adapter,” Electrek wrote.
Elon Musk said at the FT Future of Cars Conference about adding the adapters, “It’s a little trickier in the US because we have a different connector than the rest of the industry, but we will be adding the rest of the industry connector as an option to Superchargers in the US.”
Washington has been pressuring Musk and Tesla to do this so that more consumers would be comfortable going electric. So it seems like it will happen, the question is how soon?
Jon Rettinger said “Is this the car equivalent of Apple offering iMessage for Android?”
This is good news for EV manufacturers and consumers in the United States.