Australia’s cheapest EV charging is coming soon: start-up to massively undercut Tesla with car wash fast-charging stations

Australia’s cheapest EV charging is coming soon, with a bold new plan to transform the humble public car wash into a high-tech charging station, with electricity costs that massively undercut the Tesla Supercharger network.

And it will be very cheap. Consider that Tesla now charges around 52 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for its Supercharger network, and the NRMA fast-charging network is around 40 cents, or 32 cents for NRMA members.

But the planned Bell Hub charging network will reduce those costs to just 10 cent per kWh, which would make it by far the cheapest fast-charging option in Australia.

And they won’t be too hard to find, either. The Bell Resources plan would see some 63 car wash sites around Australia converted to the Bell Hub network, complete with 350kW DC ABB ultra-fast chargers imported from Sweden.

Why so cheap? The power would be partly supplied by rooftop solar, and the company plans to further subsidise the price with car wash revenues. The idea, we imagine, is that while you’re waiting for you car to charge, you’ll notice how dirty it is, and then pop in for a quick rinse, too.

“Bell Hub intends operating a network of Ultra-fast Electric Vehicle (EV) charging stations, co-located with car washing and takeaway coffee,” the company says. “Across Australia on a commercial scale, targeting both passenger and electric light commercial vehicles.”

According to the Australian Financial Review, the company has taken on 63 car wash businesses, seven other car wash properties, and a further seven greenfields sites, with the network stretching across NSW, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and the ACT.