What are the different charging solutions?
Where can I recharge my electric car? Good question! Charging is one of the first questions we ask ourselves before switching to electric cars.
Today, there are many choices when it comes to recharging solutions, and it's up to you to choose the one that suits you best.
Let's discover them together!
Home charging stations
Today in France, 8 out of 10 electric car owners recharge at home. But between the standard plug, the reinforced plug and the Wallbox, it's not easy to choose. We explain it all!
230 V socket
To recharge your electric car, the most affordable solution is to plug it into a conventional socket. However, you'll need to make sure that your home's electrical network can handle such a charge, by calling in a professional. Power is limited to between 1.6 kW and 2.3 kW on average, but may be sufficient if you recharge your vehicle every night for your daily commute.
Reinforced socket: Green'Up
If you want to recharge a little faster without breaking the bank, you can buy a reinforced socket. Legrand Green'Up. This equipment looks like a conventional outdoor socket, but has been designed for regular recharging of an electric vehicle. It has a power rating of up to 3.2 kW, enabling you to regain around 200 kilometers ofrange overnight.
Home terminal: Wallbox
A Wallbox is a wall-mounted box for recharging electric cars. It can be installed in an individual's garage, or in a company or local authority parking lot.
The Wallbox charging station is the most recommended solution for recharging your electric car. It's the fastest, most flexible and safest way to charge an electric car at home. A wide range of products is available, with options such as power adjustment, remote control, consultation via an integrated display, locking and access control.
Wallbox power ranges from 3.7 kW to 22 kW. With a Wallbox, you'll always have a full battery in the morning.
Public charging stations
In addition to home recharging solutions, electric car owners can also rely on recharging stations whose power output allows normal, accelerated and rapid recharging at over 22 kW.
Where can I find a charging point for my electric car?
The stations enable private individuals to recharge their vehicle batteries just about anywhere in France. Today, there are almost 80,000 recharging points spread across France by 2023.
Finding your charging station couldn't be easier! Localize your nearest charging station by downloading the ChargeMap application on your smartphone or our Easy Charging Quality application.
How much does a full battery charge cost for an electric car?
Before talking about cost, it's important to review the different payment methods available for your electric car.
What are the different access methods?
- Access badge : To charge your electric vehicle at a public charging station, you'll need a charging card in most cases. In many cases, this was given to you when you purchased your electric vehicle. If not, you can order one from various operators. Discover our Beev charging card!
- Credit card: Increasingly present when offered, payment by credit card is often made via a mobile application. In this case, a QR code can be scanned to authorize payment and access to the terminal. Some kiosks are now equipped with contactless credit card terminals. In this case, a pre-authorization is made on your card for the duration of the recharge, and you are then billed the actual amount, a bit like at a gas station.
- Plug & load is the latest method. It's also the simplest. All you have to do is plug your vehicle into the charging station, which will then communicate with you to initiate the charge and bill you. This system already exists on networks such as Fastned, Ionity and Tesla's Superchargers.
Would you like to order your Beev recharge card ?
Our card makes it easy to recharge your electric car at any charging station in Europe.
How much does recharging cost?
It's possible to recharge your electric car for free - yes, you heard us right. Don't panic, we'll explain everything!
While most major shopping centers offer free charging, there is a whole network of private charging stations that issue access cards, as we explained earlier. These access cards may be specific to the network used, or interoperable, or usable on a number of partner networks.
The cost of a recharge varies from a few cents to several dozen euros.
The main factors influencing the price of recharging are the power of the station and its location. As with petrol, an ultra-fast charging station located on a freeway service area will be more expensive than a slow station in the city. To find out all the prices before recharging, download our Easy Charging Quality mobile application.
One thing's for sure: your electric car will save you money.
How much does a home charging station cost?
Let's move on to home recharging, the most popular option for electric car users.
Home recharging is undoubtedly the most economical way of recharging your electric car. In terms of price, the electricity used to power your electric car will cost you no more than that used to run your oven or washing machine.
Green'Up socket
Expect to pay around €60 for such an outlet, and up to €150 if it comes with a differential circuit breaker. Note, however, that this price does not include professional installation, which is strongly recommended.
Wallbox
Wallboxes cost between €500 and €1,500, and you can take advantage of a 30% tax credit on purchase and installation, regardless of income. To benefit from government subsidies, and to ensure that your installation is safe and compliant, it's essential to work with a qualified IRVE (Infrastructures de recharge pour véhicules électriques) installer.
If you want to know the advantages and disadvantages of the Green'Up reinforced socket and the Wallbox, go to here.
How much does a full battery charge cost for an electric car?
As you know, the electric car is presented as the alternative to thermal cars using polluting fuels and dependence on fossil fuels. But is the electric car really that attractive to use?
An electric car's consumption varies according to a number of factors, from battery capacity to vehicle use and driving speed. Depending on this, recharging will be more or less frequent. Another factor is the unit of measurement used. For a combustion-powered car, we use the indicator liter per hundred kilometers to talk about gasoline/diesel consumption. For an electric car, we speak of kilowatt-hours per hundred kilometers.
For your information in France, the average consumption of electric vehicles is between 13 kWh/100 km and 20 kWh/100 km
Cost of refill
It's easy to calculate how much it will cost to recharge your electric car!
Simply take the consumption of your electric car, which averages between 12 and 20 kWh/100 km, and multiply by your energy supplier's kilowatt-hour tariff. Taking the 2022 regulated sales tariff (TRV) of 0.1841€/kWh for peak hours and 0.147€/kWh for off-peak hours, we arrive at the indicative values below.
What financing solutions are available for a charging station?
There are several ways of financing your charging station installation, which can sometimes prove costly. Firstly, there are a number of grants available to help reduce your installation costs, such as :
- tax credit
- the Advenir grant
- VAT reduction
However, in addition to these various forms of assistance, you can also take out a micro-loan to finance your charging station.
Many organizations, such as FinFrog, make it quick and easy to obtain financing. You can obtain up to €600 within 24 hours, and spread the monthly payments for your recharging solution over several months.
