Tesla has reduced Supercharging prices in many regions as its charging business starts to mature a little.
One of the biggest advantages of electric vehicles remains that their cost of operations is much lower than vehicles with internal combustion engines, thanks to electricity generally being much cheaper than gas.
However, the cost of both gas and electricity has been skyrocketing over the last year, especially in Europe because of the war in Ukraine and restrictions on Russian oil and gas.
It used to be difficult to pay more than $5 or $10 for a full charge at a Tesla Supercharger.
After several price increases throughout the last year, now many Supercharger stations are charging $0.50 per kWh, which can result in a cost of $30 to charge 60 kWh.
Many Tesla owners across several markets have been reporting over the last few days that Tesla has reduced prices at their local stations.
There’s no way to track Supercharger pricing globally, but Tesla owners can see prices at stations around them through the navigation system inside their vehicles.
A Tesla owner in California reported that local prices are down by as much as 5 cents per kWh:
Tesla cut the price of supercharging across LA and parts of California it seems! Some superchargers are 5 cents/kWh cheaper on peak which adds up! Some superchargers did increase though for their on peak pricing. pic.twitter.com/F2uYSAIZvW
Some price drops in Europe are even more significant with prices going down by as much as $0.10 per kWh.
Tesla’s charging business is maturing
Charging stations are slaves to the electric utility rates and they undeniably influence prices more than anything else, but the charging business as a whole is also evolving.
It’s only about 10 years old and only now the volume of electric vehicles on the road is starting to be high enough that the business is maturing.
When it comes to Tesla, the automaker has been making a lot of moves to adapt lately, like expanding time of use rates to match high traffic times. Of course, it is also slowly opening the Supercharger network up to non-Tesla EV, which is turning the network into a real business rather than just a feature to help sell Tesla vehicles.
It is now starting to morph into its final form: a sustainable (both ecologically and financially) global fast-charging network that enables long-distance travel in electric vehicles.
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CONCEPT AMG GT XX redefines performance: Technology pioneer shatters record after record | Nardò, 2025.
Mercedes took its GT XX concept out to the Nardo high-speed test track in Southern Italy and came back with a slew of records for electric distance driving – including one for driving a distance equal to the circumference of the world.
The concept uses two axial flux motors and a 114kWh battery, with a top speed of 223mph or 359 km/h. And it’s capable of charging at 850kW – and that’s continuous draw, not peak draw. That means it can add around 400km/250 miles of WLTP range in 5 minutes.
So, with that high top speed and that incredibly quick charging rate, what’s a manufacturer to do, other than set some records?
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The Nardo test track in Southern Italy is used by many manufacturers for high-speed testing. It’s known for its long, banked circular test track which allows cars to maintain extremely high speeds for long periods.
This is the track where speed and distance records are often set, and Mercedes set out to do the same with its concept.
Over the last 7 days, 13 hours, 23 minutes and 7.10 seconds, Mercedes ran the car, day and night, to see how it does at high speeds and without a break at all. And in doing so it set EV distance and endurance records set recently by other brands like XPeng and Xiaomi, and even by Mercedes’ own CLA (and, reaching even further back, an old one set by Tesla Youtuber Bjorn Nyland… without manufacturer support and on public roads).
Mercedes’ new record smashed the most recent 24 hour record, which stood at 3,961km (2,461mi) by the XPeng P7. The GT XX, with manufacturer support, fast charging and the right test track, managed to drive 5,479km (3,405mi) in the same 24 hour period, nearly 1,000 miles further than the previous record.
But Mercedes didn’t just go for 24 hours – that 7 days number mentioned above is how long it took the GT XX to drive a distance equal to the full circumference of the Earth, which is 40,075km (24,901mi) at the equator. In total, Mercedes did 3,177 laps of the 12.5km/7.8-mile track. Mercedes was looking to finish the trip in less than eight days, as a tribute to Jules Verne’s “Around the World in Eighty Days.”
It was helped in doing so by the incredibly quick charging rate the car is capable of, along with a fast charger that is capable of delivering that amount of electricity. 850kW is a lot more than any consumer vehicle or fast charger can currently deliver (usually 250-350kW max in US/EU), and is probably more than is practical or necessary for consumer cars. It’s even faster than the 600kW mid-race charging for Formula E. And it shows that the limits many think electric vehicles have are really not there in reality.
But in fact… Mercedes used two cars for this test, and both of them completed the same grueling test. Each of them finished with a similar distance traveled, only a 25km difference between them.
For the test, Mercedes engineers calculated that the optimal trade-off between energy efficiency and fast charging would be to drive the car consistently at 300km/h (186mph) around the track until it needed a charge, with the car driving an average of around 5,300km (3,293mi) per day.
Mercedes didn’t release any statistics on how much charging was done and how much energy was consumed, but it was certainly far more than the average consumption that you would see in normal driving, as is the case for any high speed track applications. There was certainly a lot of energy going in and out of that battery, and through those motors, over the course of those 8 days, and yet the cars seem to have handled it just fine.
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View of an offshore wind energy park during a press moment of Orsted, on Tuesday 06 August 2024, on the transportation of goods with Heavy Lift Cargo Drones to the offshore wind turbines in the Borssele 1 and 2 wind farm in Zeeland, Netherlands.
Nicolas Maeterlinck | Afp | Getty Images
Shares in wind farm developer Orsted tumbled soon as trading kicked off on Monday after the U.S. government ordered the company to halt construction of a nearly completed project.
By mid-morning, the company’s shares were around 17% lower, with shares hitting a record low according to LSEG data.
Late on Friday the U.S.’ Bureau of Ocean Energy Management had issued a stop-work order for the Revolution Wind Project off of Rhode Island. According to Orsted, the project is 80% complete and 45 out of 65 wind turbines have been installed.
The company also said that it would comply with the U.S. order and that it was considering options to resolve the issue and press ahead with construction.
The order comes at a critical time for Orsted, which is seeking to raise much-needed capital under plans that analysts suggested were now under pressure.
Orsted had announced plans for a 60 billion Danish kroner ($9.4 billion) rights issue earlier this month. On Monday, the company said it would continue with the proposal, noting that it had the support of its majority stakeholder, the Danish state.
Shares have pulled back sharply since the rights issue plans were announced.
In a Monday note, Jacob Pedersen, head of equity research at Sydbank, said the potential financial consequences of the U.S.’ order had led to uncertainty about whether Orsted would be able to continue with its capital raising plans.
“The financial consequences of the stop-work order will at best be the ongoing costs of the work being stopped,” he said, according to a Google translation. In the worst-case scenario, the Revolution Wind Project would never supply electricity to the U.S., he added.
“In that case, Orsted faces a double-digit billion write-down and significant additional costs to get out of contracts. This will, by all accounts, increase the capital raising requirement to significantly more than DKK 60 billion,” Pedersen said.
He that the company’s Monday announcement to push ahead with its rights issue plans suggested it did not expect the worst-case outcome and was expecting its 60 billion Danish kroner target to be sufficient.
“Orsted’s assessment of this is positive – but it is no guarantee that it will end up like this,” Pedersen said.
President Donald Trump‘s attack on solar and wind projects threatens to raise energy prices for consumers and undermine a stretched electric grid that’s already straining to meet rapidly growing demand, renewable energy executives warn.
Trump has long said wind power turbines are unattractive and endanger birds, and that solar installations take up too much land. This week, he said his administration will not approve solar and wind projects, the latest salvo in a campaign the president has waged against the renewable energy industry since taking office.
“We will not approve wind or farmer destroying Solar,” Trump posted on Truth Social Wednesday. “The days of stupidity are over in the USA!!!”
Trump’s statement this week seemed to confirm industry fears that the Interior Department will block federal permits for solar and wind projects. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum took control of all permit approvals last month in a move that the American Clean Power Association criticized as “obstruction,” calling it “unprecedented political review.”
The Interior Department blocking permits would slow the growth of the entire solar and wind industry, top executives at renewable developers Arevon, Avantus and Engie North America told CNBC.
Even solar and wind projects on private land may need approvals from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service if, for example, a waterway or animal species is affected, the executives told CNBC. The three power companies are among the top 10 renewable developers in the U.S., according to energy research firm Enverus.
The Interior Department “will not give preferential treatment to massive, unreliable projects that make no sense for the American people or that risk harming communities or the environment,” a spokesperson told CNBC when asked if new permits would be issued for solar and wind construction.
Choking off renewables will worsen a looming power supply shortage, harm the electric grid and lead to higher electricity prices for consumers, said Kevin Smith, CEO of Arevon, a solar and battery storage developer headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona, that’s active in 17 states. Arevon operates five gigawatts of power equivalent to $10 billion of capital investment.
“I don’t think everybody realizes how big the crunch is going to be,” Smith said. “We’re making that crunch more and more difficult with these policy changes.”
Uncertainty hits investment
The red tape at the Interior Department and rising costs from Trump’s copper and steel tariffs have created market instability that makes planning difficult, the renewable executives said.
“We don’t want to sign contracts until we know what the playing field is,” said Cliff Graham, CEO of Avantus, a solar and battery storage developer headquartered in San Diego. Avantus has built three gigawatts of solar and storage across the desert Southwest.
“I can do whatever you want me to do and have a viable business, I just need the rules set and in place,” Graham said.
Engie North America, the U.S. arm of a global energy company based in Paris, is slashing its planned investment in the U.S. by 50% due to tariffs and regulatory uncertainty, said David Carroll, the chief renewables officer who leads the American subsidiary. Engie could cut its plans even more, he said.
Engie’s North American subsidiary, headquartered in Houston, will operate about 11 gigawatts of solar, battery storage and wind power by year end.
Multinationals like Engie have long viewed the U.S. as one of the most stable business environments in the world, Carroll said. But that assessment is changing in Engie’s boardroom and across the industry, he said.
“The stability of the U.S. business market is no longer really the gold standard,” Carroll said.
Rising costs
Arevon is seeing costs for solar and battery storage projects increase by as much as 30% due to the metal tariffs, said Smith, the CEO. Many renewable developers are renegotiating power prices with utilities to cover the sudden spike in costs because projects no longer pencil out financially, he said.
Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act ends two key tax credits for solar and wind projects in late 2027, making conditions even more challenging. The investment tax credit supported new renewable construction and the production credit boosted clean electricity generation.
Those tax credits were just passed on to consumers, Smith said. Their termination and the rising costs from tariffs will mean higher utility bills for families and businesses, he said.
The price that Avantus charges for solar power has roughly doubled to $60 per megawatt-hour as interest rates and tariffs have increased over the years, said CEO Graham. Prices will surge again to around $100 per megawatt-hour when the tax credits are gone, he said.
“The small manufacturers, small companies and mom and pops will see their electric bills go up, and it’ll start pushing the small entrepreneurs out of the industry or out of the marketplace,” Graham said.
Renewable projects that start construction by next July, a year after the One Big Beautiful Act became law, will still qualify for the tax credits. Arevon, Avantus and Engie are moving forward with projects currently under construction, but the outlook is less certain for projects later in the decade.
The U.S. will see a big downturn in new renewable power generation starting in the second half of 2026 through 2028 as new projects no longer qualify for tax credits, said Smith, the head of Arevon.
“The small- and medium-sized players that can’t take the financial risk, some of them will disappear,” Smith said. “You’re going to see less projects built in the sector.”
Artificial intelligence power crunch
Fewer renewable power plants could increase the risk of brownouts or blackouts, Smith said. Electricity demand is surging from the data centers that technology companies are building to train artificial intelligence systems. PJM Interconnection, the largest electrical grid in the U.S. that coordinates wholesale electricity in 13 states and the District of Columbia, has warned of tight power supplies because too little new generation is coming online.
Renewables are the power source that can most quickly meet demand, Smith at Arevon said. More than 90% of the power waiting to connect to the grid is solar, battery storage or wind, according to data from Enverus.
“The power requirement is largely going to be coming from the new energy sector or not at all,” so without it, “the grid becomes substantially hampered,” Smith said.
Trump is prioritizing oil, gas and nuclear power as “the most effective and reliable tools to power our country,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said.
“President Trump serves the American people who voted to implement his America First energy agenda – not solar and wind executives who are sad that Biden’s Green New Scam subsidies are ending,” Kelly said.
But new natural gas plants won’t come online for another five years due to supply issues, new nuclear power is a decade away and no new coal plants are on the drawing board.
Utilities may have to turn away data centers at some point because there isn’t enough surplus power to run them, and no one wants to risk blackouts at hospitals, schools and homes, Arevon’s Smith said. This would pressure the U.S. in its race against China to master AI, a Trump administration priority.
“The panic in the data center, AI world is probably not going to set in for another 12 months or so, when they start realizing that they can’t get the power they need in some of these areas where they’re planning to build data centers,” Smith said.
“Then we’ll see what happens,” said the University of Chicago MBA, who’s worked in the energy industry for 35 years. “There may be a reversal in policy to try and build whatever we can and get power onto the grid.”