For apartment dwellers, renters and inner-city residents without off-street parking, the idea of buying an electric vehicle usually triggers an immediate roadblock – 'where on earth do I plug it in?'.
Many would think that without somewhere to plug in at home, EV ownership is a logistical nightmare. But a growing cohort of Australian drivers is proving that relying solely on public chargers isn't just doable – it’s actually very easy.
We spoke to three drivers who made the leap from ICE to EV without home charging to find out how they make it work.
Sustainability expert Kate McHugh bought her EV – a Volvo XC40 – in December last year, after her 13-year-old Volkswagen Golf started to get a little worse for wear.
"I work in the sustainability space ... so it was part of, I guess, walking the talk," Kate says.
"It's the way of the future, and I think that – longer term – combustion vehicles are on their way out.
"I wanted a car that I'd have for a few years, and my understanding was that the operating costs would be significantly cheaper."
Before committing, Kate sought advice from a fellow apartment dweller in Crows Nest who got by more than comfortably – checking local plug availability once a week via an app. Taking that advice on board, Kate sourced a nearby public station at the Rose Bay foreshore that seamlessly integrated into her morning exercise routine.
"I take my car, park it in a public car park on the foreshore, leave the car on charge, and go out and I do my ocean ski paddle session in the morning. By the time I come back, my car is fully charged," she says.
"I get between 400 and 500 kilometres a charge out of my car. With typical driving, probably two and a bit weeks ... it just depends on the volume of driving I'm doing."
While Kate admits EV ownership requires a tiny bit of extra planning compared to a petrol car, she says time spent charging is far more productive than the traditional servo experience.
Rather than actively supervising a petrol pump, the charging window is free time to grab a coffee, hit the shops or grab something to eat.
"People think that, when they stop for petrol, it's just two minutes, but actually, you pull up, you wait for a bowser, you then fill the car, you queue up to pay," she says.
"And if you're on a long-distance trip, you usually frigg around in the servo for half an hour anyway."
On the odd occasion she does either a road trip or a drive to somewhere slightly unfamiliar, her car has actively helped her find somewhere to top up on charge.
"In my car, which is a Volvo XC40, if I'm low on charge and I put a destination into Google Maps, it will offer to route me past a charger and tell me how long I have to stop and how much charge I'll have left. The technology in some of the cars is such that it actively helps you."
'I've never had range anxiety'
For Melbourne mum of two Erinna Giblin and her partner Tom, holiday travel was a consideration when she was looking into buying an EV about a month ago. They make frequent trips to Albury, more than 300km away, to visit Erinna's parents.
"I was aware – because I originally come from a regional city – that you don't want to get stuck," Erinna says.
Still, that didn't deter her from switching from an ICE vehicle to an EV, especially with petrol prices skyrocketing after the US war in the Middle East began.
"This was just before the government announced that they were going to cut the fuel excise temporarily, so petrol prices were going through the roof. The last time I filled up, my car was only a quarter empty, and it was over $45, and I was like – 'this has to end'."
After some research into tax savings for EV novated leases and the knowledge that her parents could make the trip from Albury to Melbourne in their Volkswagen ID.4, she found an ex-display Volkswagen ID.5 and snapped it up.
"I was never going to buy a hatchback with like a 100km range," Erinna says. "When I've spoken to colleagues at work who might have a BYD or a different brand and their ranges are less, they've said 'Oh yeah, the Volkswagen, that's got a really good battery'."
Like Kate and Rosco, Erinna has no off-street parking but found comfort in advice from a friend who relies entirely on an ultra-rapid charger for 20 minutes on Sunday afternoons.
"I downloaded the Plug Share app that has up-to-the-minute, live availability, and an interactive map. So it's really easy to just find one that's nearby. And if you start to look, they're popping up all over the place," she says.
"I've never had that range anxiety that people talk about.
"It was actually inconveniently fast last weekend. We went to the shops to pick up some things ... it was at maybe 20 per cent and it got to 80 per cent in 20 minutes, so Tom had to go back and move the car – we wanted it to be longer!"
For Erinna, the move has given her and her partner more financial freedom.
"Rising petrol prices were the biggest deciding factor. We were paying off a regular car loan that wasn't a novated lease ... we probably had about $24,000 owing on that car," she says.
"The thought that was occurring to me very strongly was 'this is a depreciating asset that I'm paying off'."
Now, she's paying about $15 or so per charge – covered within her novated lease.
"Everything just kind of culminated in it being the right choice, and I'm really happy with it."
EV advocate and owner of Sydney-based used EV business Amazing EV, Rosco, was an early adopter of the Tesla Model Y. Despite living in a Potts Point apartment block without charging facilities, he bit the bullet in 2022.
"I decided to just jump in without any real plans or approvals in the apartment block, just to see if I could rely purely on the public network," Rosco says.
Living in Potts Point meant there were no chargers directly outside his door, but he quickly found a rhythm using the local network.
"We are lucky to have three or four Tesla charging stations within a 10-kilometre radius. I used to go to the Broadway shopping centre, park in the basement charging area, and take the lift straight up to do my grocery shopping. Twenty minutes later, job's done, the charging was finished."
Before the switch, Rosco was driving a Volkswagen Tiguan, costing him $120 a week for 550km of fuel. Now, he uses Tesla’s off-peak charging rates to keep costs incredibly low.
"During the daytime, charging can cost 60 or 70 cents per kilowatt-hour, but off-peak early in the morning or in the evening, it can be down to 35 or 40 cents," he says.
"If you're spending 35 cents a kilowatt-hour, and it's a full 60-kilowatt-hour tank, that's $18."
Rosco eventually investigated installing a personal charger in his apartment block, but the numbers didn't add up.
"By the time we did the calculations for a piecemeal, one-off installation, it would have been a 10-year payback period. Because my public charging experience has been so good, it just didn't bother me. The chargers work 999 times out of 1000."
Though he drives more frequently in a week than your typical Aussie, Rosco admits relying on the public network is better for city drivers than those who do long commutes to the regions or lengthy road trips.
"I can't recount stories about the holiday travel experience. We don't have children, we don't travel in the holiday time," he said. "When everyone goes on holiday, yeah, it's a different scenario and every holiday system is stretched."
However, he said relying on the Telsa network – as he does in the city – would hopefully get him through a road trip if he decided to take one.
"On the screen [of the car] it tells you if there's no vacancies. The network knows what's available, how close it is and how far you've got to get there. It's good when you're trip planning."
Jemimah Clegg is Drive's Consumer Editor, using her 'everyday driver' perspective to bring car, driving and road advice to all Australians – whether they are car enthusiasts or not. She has been a journalist and editor for more than a decade, working in property and lifestyle news, first for Domain and more recently for REA Group. Jemimah has a knack for data stories, and you'll often find her noodling with a spreadsheet or making a line graph. Her work has appeared in The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Canberra Times and many other publications.
