Fast-charging network along Australia’s East Coast
Australia’s National Roads and Motorists’ Association (NRMA) has built 20 of a total of 40 EV stations planned along the spectacular South-East Coast of Australia. The network runs from Sydney, all the way through New South Wales and the Capital territory up to the Victorian border.
The charging station most recently added to the fast-charging network is the site in Bega. The fast-charging stations along the network allow electric vehicles to recharge in around 30 minutes for those that can take it or else still in under three hours.
In June last year, the association pledged 10 million Australian dollars (over 6 million euros) to the network that uses Tritium’s fast-charging technology. The Australian company is based just a little further up the East Coast in Brisbane but has a European base in Amsterdam as well as a US base in Torrence, California. While Tritium technology has been installed across the globe, the company’s home country of Australia has been slow on the uptake of electric vehicles. “We know one of the key reason electric vehicle uptake has been relatively slow in Australia so far is because of ‘range anxiety’, so we’re building this extensive network of chargers to safeguard against that happening,” says Nell Payne, executive general manager of NMRA.
Stations have already been installed at Sydney Olympic Park, Jindabyne, Orange, Byron Bay, Bathurst and Narrandera. The most recent addition, the Bega station, should connect drivers all the way to the Victorian border. Other places with planned fast-charging stations are Holbrook, Lithgow, Gunnedah and Jugiong. Initially, the public charging network is free of charge, but the organisation says that they will be implementing a fee for non-members in the future.
The network’s stations will be using renewable energy, either generated on-site or in agreement with the NRMA energy supplier.
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