SAE’s NACS certification is ready, and it’ll fix every EV charging problem at once
SAE has followed through on its plan to finish its NACS certification by the end of the year, and the NACS standard is now ready to go. And the new standard promises to solve a lot of charging problems in one fell swoop.
Tesla released specifications of its charging connector in November 2022. It called it the “North American Charging Standard,” which was somewhat of an absurd name at the time, given that Tesla was the only company using it.
However, since Tesla is a majority of the US EV market, Tesla’s argument was that most of the cars and most of the DC charging stations in America already used Tesla’s connector, so it should be considered a de facto standard anyway.
For a few months not many people took this seriously, until Ford shook up the industry by announcing it would adopt the NACS plug on upcoming vehicles. Soon after, GM made the same move, and now basically everyone else has.
This led SAE, the professional engineering organization which develops industry standards, to take up the flag of creating a real, independent standard that is no longer in the hands of Tesla. This is an important move because many governments and companies would understandably have an issue with a single company having control over a standard that, at this point, it seems like everyone is planning to use.
How NACS will solve several EV charging problems at once
We had another chat with Rodney McGee, Ph.D., of the University of Delaware, who chaired SAE’s NACS task force, and told us that the new standard will soon be announced by the White House. He was understandably excited about the standard getting finished so quickly, and told us how NACS is going to solve a lot of problems with EV charging all at the same time.
In particular, it should make charging installation cheaper for commercial entities, leading to cheaper and easier charging for businesses (including, potentially, for large apartment buildings); make charging more interoperable between commercial and personal vehicles; and unlock new possibilities for street charging for electric vehicles.
The main reason for this is the standard is preserving NACS’ support for 277 volts, as opposed to the 208-240 voltage of J1772. This simple change unlocks a cascade of benefits that should smooth out several charging problems.
Why does this matter? 277V is one phase of a three-phase 480V supply, which is the form that most commercial utility connections come in (particularly those that support DC chargers). Which means that secondary step-down transformers are no longer necessary for AC chargers, making EV charging installations cheaper and more efficient.
When you make EV charging installations cheaper and easier for businesses, this means more chargers at workplaces, giving people who can’t charge at home another option. It means more opportunity charging at any other place you might happen to park, and more opportunity charging means more EVs plugged in at any given time which means more battery capacity available on the grid in a potential V2G future.
Saving businesses money is all well and good, but the most important point here is that by making commercial installations cheaper, this means that mixed-use apartment buildings can more easily install banks of EV chargers, without needing big transformer rooms to further step down voltages. And that means that more people will be opened up to the convenience of having a charger at the place where their car spends the most time.
The news is even good for people who don’t have a parking spot – city-dwellers who use street parking. The NACS standard includes a provision that would enable the installation of chargers in lampposts, something that we’ve seen trials of in London. There have been similar efforts in the US, but those are subpar because the J1772 standard requires a permanently-attached cable, which means that streetside cables get dropped, broken, laid around, and otherwise abused.
The new NACS standard instead uses a standardized receptacle – which is in fact the same one used in the EU and China – which can be plugged into with a ~$100-200 carry-along cable that EV drivers can keep in their car (and the receptacle does have a locking mechanism). Making each driver responsible for their own cable makes maintenance easier in public spaces where otherwise, nobody’s really willing to take ownership of ensuring cables don’t get abused.
NACS also allows AC and DC through the same connector, unlike J1772. CCS is similar to the J1772 plug, but with an additional two pins on the bottom, so the connectors aren’t identical. With NACS, the connectors are identical for both types of charging.
Another potential upside here involves medium and heavy duty vehicles, which could charge at up to 52kW AC from the same receptacle as a light duty vehicle can charge at 20kW, by using 3 phases or 1 phase respectively. 20kW can be a bit on the low side for some larger vehicles – school buses and the like – so allowing those vehicles to charge at up to 52kW from the same place light duty can charge at 20kW would be a big boon as well.
And finally, all of these boons add together to a world where it’s easier to install and maintain chargers, and easier for everyone to be using those chargers wherever they’re parked, which means more cars plugged in at any given time. And if everyone is plugged in all the time, that means more capacity available for a potential vehicle-to-grid future. If V2G ever takes off, we will want to have as many cars plugged in as possible, because more cars plugged in means more capacity available for the grid. And that means making AC infrastructure cheap, which is what 277V support and carry-along cables enable.
There is one potential problem on the horizon, though: California and the US federal government (through NEVI) have both put a lot of money into charging station deployment, and the original intent of that money was to install roadside DC chargers that are as compatible as possible. So now, will those rules fully embrace NACS and allow the money to be used to install the new standard, or will they require CCS-compatible deployments so as not to leave an installed base of vehicles behind, even though CCS is now, effectively, a dead standard? (one compromise option being discussed is to require CCS for DC chargers, but throw full weight behind NACS for AC chargers)
This decision point is also a little ironic, since NACS’ existence seems to have been spurred on by NEVI in the first place. When the government offered billions of dollars to companies that install chargers with the restriction that those chargers be useable with multiple vehicles, that’s what got Tesla to finally offer a “standard.” At the time, it wasn’t really a standard because only Tesla was using it, and it was somewhat of a last-ditch effort to save the Tesla connector. Then, when Ford decided to use NACS, that’s what started all the others dominos falling. Now, NACS is dominant, but it only happened because of NEVI in the first place – and NEVI now has the difficult decision over whether to embrace the (positive) situation it caused, even if it will give some of the installed base an effective “use-by” date as a shift to NACS will inevitably mean fewer CCS/J1772 chargers over time.
Electrek’s Take
We’re actually pretty amazed that this standardization process finished already. SAE intended to finish by the end of the year, but standards can take a long time and require a lot of cooperation from organizations with differing motivations.
Part of why this process could be finished so quickly is because we’re now further into the world’s electrification journey, and auto manufacturers, many of whom now have departments getting into the charging business, can see the benefit of making charger installations cheaper.
And while we may have been a little hyperbolic in the title, this really does fix one of the few real problems with electric cars right now. There are a lot of perceived problems with EVs which rely on misconceptions, but one that isn’t a misconception is that there are bigger hurdles to owning an EV for people who don’t have a garage.
With cheaper AC charger installation benefits allowing better charging options for workplace, garage and street parking, this all adds up to a win for environmental justice. It makes EV charging easier for renters, or for people who otherwise do not have access to their own garage/off-street parking where they can install a charger. And that means more EVs in lower-income communities, and cleaner air too.
This has been a problem for a long time, and some piecemeal solutions have been proposed and are in the works, but this standard should help make that problem more solvable.
Ironically, the one thing the standard doesn’t solve is the problem we pointed out in the headline of our previous article on this – Plug & Charge. That article laid out how authentication issues are holding Plug & Charge back from being as good as it could be in the US, and unfortunately the SAE NACS standard (which it calls J3400) won’t solve that. However, work is ongoing on a solution for that problem, in a separate proceeding, and it seems like the NACS changeover may be the impetus needed to get it solved once and for all.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Yes, Virginia, there are still great EV lease deals to be had in December. Hyundai continues to offer EV leases for under $200 a month, and the BMW i4 can be leased for the same price it was when the federal tax credit was still in effect. With 2025 models disappearing fast, this might be your last shot to snag a year-end lease deal on an EV. Check out the standouts below.
2025 Hyundai IONIQ 6 lease from $189/month
The 2025 Hyundai IONIQ 6 remains a fantastic deal: the IONIQ 6 SE Standard Range can be leased from $189 per month for 24 months with a $3,999 due at signing (12,000 miles per year). Its effective cost is just $356, and this month’s IONIQ 6 SE lease includes $13,000 in lease cash that you can’t get elsewhere. The offer is good until January 2.
Our friends at CarsDirect report that the SEL trim is actually a better deal at $239 with $3,999 at signing, with an effective cost of $406. Even though its MSRP is over $7,700 higher than the SE, it’s just $50 more a month to lease. The SE Standard Range has a range of 240 miles, whereas other styles have a range of up to 342.
As usual, offers vary according to location, and this is a regional offer based in California.
Click here to find a local dealer that may have the Hyundai IONIQ 6 in stock. –trusted affiliate link
2025 Hyundai IONIQ 5 lease from $189/month
Believe it or not, the 2025 Hyundai IONIQ 5 SE Standard Range RWD, which starts at $44,200, can still be leased through January 2 for $189 a month for 36 months (10,000 miles per year) with $3,999 due at signing. That works out to an effective monthly cost of about $300.
The IONIQ 5 SE RWD Standard Range offers an EPA-estimated 245 miles of range, and this particular offer is available in the Los Angeles and greater California metro areas (I’ve seen it at dealers in Carlsbad and Santa Monica, for example). And if you’re tempted by an upgrade, the SEL RWD trim is just $50 more per month under the same terms.
Click here to find a local dealer that may have the Hyundai IONIQ 5 in stock. –trusted affiliate link
2026 Subaru Solterra 5 lease from $299/month
In several regions, the 2026 Subaru Solterra Premium can be leased for $299 per month for 36 months, with a down payment of $2,799 due at signing, resulting in an effective monthly cost of $377. That makes it $95 per month cheaper to lease than a 2026 Toyota bZ, which is $472. (These figures are for California.)
A $500 loyalty discount is available to returning lessees. It doesn’t require a trade-in and can be transferred to household members. If you factor in the loyalty discount, the Solterra’s effective cost drops to $363. The offer ends January 2.
Subaru’s advertised lease prices are based on 10,000 miles a year, but that’s changeable. However, a larger mileage allowance will lower the EV’s residual value, making it more expensive.
Click here to find a local dealer that may have the Subaru Solterra in stock. –trusted affiliate link
2025 Ford Mustang Mach-E from $219/month
The 2025 Ford Mustang Mach-E can still be leased for $219 per month for 24 months with a $4,499 due at signing (10,500 miles per year) until January 5. In this configuration, the Mach-E has a range of up to 300 miles.
This is a regional offer for California, but the great deal isn’t limited to just that state. The example includes a total of $8,750 in lease cash; however, the catch is that if you opt for the lease cash, you have to decline the free home charger with installation or Ford’s $2,000 public charging credit.
Click here to find a local dealer that may have the Ford Mustang Mach-E in stock. –trusted affiliate link
2025 BMW i4 from $399/month
Remarkably, the 2025 BMW i4 is still leasing for the same price as it was when the federal tax credit was still in effect. In many regions, the eDrive40 can be leased for $399 for 36 months with $4,999 due at signing (10,000 miles per year). Its effective cost is just $538 per month, which is impressive when you consider that the i4’s retail price is over $60,000.
The offer, available until January 2, includes a $7,500 lease credit, and a $1,000 loyalty discount is also available for returning lessees. With the loyalty bonus, the i4’s effective monthly cost could be as low as $510.
In this configuration, the i4 has an EPA-estimated range of 318 miles. As before, BMW’s lease includes two years or 1,000 kWh of free charging with Electrify America.
Click here to find a local dealer that may have the BMW i4 in stock. –trusted affiliate link
The 30% federal solar tax credit is ending this year. If you’ve ever considered going solar, now’s the time to act. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Kia now has one of the most affordable electric SUVs in Canada. The EV5 is now on sale, starting at $43,495 CAD.
Kia opens EV5 orders in Canada
The EV5 is the electric SUV we want in the US, but we will likely never see it. After opening online orders on December 4, Kia revealed prices for the entire 2027 EV5 lineup.
Surprisingly, buyers can choose from nine trims, with prices ranging from $43,495 CAD for the base Light model to $61,495 CAD for the flagship AWD GT-Line Limited edition.
Outside of the Light trim, all EV5 variants are offered with front-wheel or all-wheel drive. Upgrading to AWD costs an extra $2,500 CAD.
Likewise, all EV5 trims, except the Light variant, are powered by an 81.4 kWh battery, providing up to 460 km (285 miles) of driving range. The entry-level Light uses a 60.4 kWh battery, good for a driving range of up to 335 km (208 miles).
All EV5 models come with a built-in NACS port, nearly 30″ of screen space in a curved panoramic display, heated front seats, and Kia Connect with OTA updates.
The interior features Kia’s new Connect Car Navigation (CCNC) infotainment system with dual 12.3″ driver display and touchscreen navigation screens, plus a 5″ climate control screen. The setup includes wireless Android Auto and Apple CarPlay capabilities.
Kia grouped the EV5 trims into tiers based on what buyers are looking for. As expected, the Light FWD trim is the best value for your money.
For those looking for a little more driving range, the Wind FWD offers up to 460 km range, while the Wind AWD is built for Canada’s harsh winters. Both include a heat pump as standard.
2027 Kia EV5 prices and range by trim
Kia said the EV5 Land Rover trim is the best option if you’re looking for a little more out of the interior. The Land Rover trim adds a memory function to the driver’s seat, a heated steering wheel, a panoramic sunroof, a smart power tailgate, and 19″ wheels.
And then there’s the EV5 GT-Line, for those looking for added performance, a sporty new look inside and out, and driver-assistance features like lane-change assist.
| 2027 Kia EV5 trim | Starting Price (CAD) (FWD/AWD) | Battery | Target Range (FWD/ AWD) | Selling Points |
| Light traction | $43,495 | 60.4 kWh | 335 km | Entry-level price, standard battery life |
| Wind | $47,495 / $49,995 | 81.4 kWh | 460 km / 415 km | Long-life battery, heat pump |
| Land | $49,995 / $52,495 | 81.4 kWh | 460 km / 415 km | Panoramic roof, smart tailgate, V2L |
| GT-Line | $55,495 / $57,995 | 81.4 kWh | 460 km / 410 km | HDA2, FCA 2, ventilated seats, sporty style |
| GT-Line Limited | $58,995 / $61,495 | 81.4 kWh | 460 km / 410 km | Head-up display, RSPA 2, Harman Kardon, digital key |
The EV5 is now available to order in Canada, outside of the entry-level FWD Light variant, which is scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2026.
Despite the wait, Kia claimed the 2027 EV5 is going on sale as “Canada’s most affordable electric SUV,” starting $43,495.
For those in the US, don’t get your hopes up. Kia said the EV5 will be sold exclusively in Canada for the North American market.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Multiple outlets are reporting on Donald Trump’s apparent effort to change US regulations to bring tiny Japanese kei cars to the US, but there’s little reason to think that effort will be serious.
Convicted felon Donald Trump has directed former reality TV contestant Sean Duffy to examine how kei cars, a category of Japanese microcars, could be brought to the US, calling them “cute.”
The statement was made yesterday at the announcement of a fuel efficiency rollback, which will raise your fuel costs by $23 billion and is explicitly intended to make cars bigger and less efficient.
And so, simply by reading the preceding two sentences, you should understand how unserious this effort is. At the same moment that a new proposal was announced to reduce fuel efficiency targets by a third, the same person who is trying to increase your fuel costs and make cars bigger and less efficient apparently also wants tiny efficient vehicles in the US. How does that make sense?
If Trump did know anything about how the auto industry works, he would not speak about making cars smaller at an event to announce rules explicitly intended towards making cars bigger – these are not compatible thoughts, and betray a lack of understanding of the reason he was even in the room to begin with.
Further, in addition to yesterday’s effort to remove CAFE rules, the EPA is currently trying to roll back President Biden’s improved exhaust standards which included a recognition of vehicle sizes becoming too large and a desire to reduce SUV/truck market share, and Mr. Trump is trying to place a 15% tariff on all Japanese goods, meaning higher prices for Americans if these cars were to come to the US.
Thinking more deeply about the reason why Mr. Trump might have mentioned kei cars to begin with, it is likely related to his recent trip to Japan. He went to Japan to negotiate an end to the unwise tariffs that he himself announced on one of America’s closest trading partners (despite that he does not have the Constitutional authority to apply them).
During that trip, he seems to have seen the tiny cars for the first time (or the first time he can remember, given his senility), and been enamored by them. So, he said yesterday (while flanked by Duffy, who showed apparent surprise as the flippant statement came out of his mouth):
“They’re very small, they’re really cute, and I said ‘How would that do in this country?’… But we’re not allowed to make them in this country and I think you’re gonna do very well with those cars, so we’re gonna approve those cars.”
-Donald Trump, upon witnessing a type of vehicle he should have known of by now, having spent 79 years globetrotting around this Earth, so how can he just be seeing this for the first time except if he’s senile.
Now, technically, here he says he wants the US to build the cars here, rather than import them from Japan. Kei cars are very popular in Japan, but rarer in other countries. Some other countries do have their own small cars similar to kei cars (for example, China’s 115-inch Wuling Mini EV), but Japan is where these vehicles have traditionally held the highest share.
There are various reasons for this, but one of them is due to the high density of Japanese cities. Kei cars are very space efficient for cities that are obsessed with space efficiency in a way that simply is not the case in the US.
Japanese cities are also connected by efficient, fast and reasonably-priced bullet trains, so getting from one side of the country to the other is easy to do without having to stuff the whole family into a vehicle that is under 134 inches long. And the regulatory regime in Japan has been built around kei cars, giving them certain advantages to incentivize their use.
Meanwhile, it’s nigh-impossible to convince any manufacturer to even build a sedan, hatchback or small SUV for the US, or to build any small-displacement vehicle. So this would require a massive change in consumer tastes, which of course manufacturers haven’t been particularly interested in leading, given they’ve been pushing SUVs for decades now.
That said, one of the reasons manufacturers have pushed SUVs is due to regulations which treat them more favorably than smaller vehicles. If those regulations were changed – and that’s what Trump and Duffy have floated – it could open the doors for smaller cars.
But there’s little reason to think either of them are serious about this, given the amount of work that would have to be done to change regulations, and given the work they’re currently doing to change the regulations in the exact opposite direction.
At a minimum, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) would have to change significantly. This is the set of rules governing safety requirements for all motor vehicles, with requirements for various vehicle classes that have been built and tweaked over time. And these requirements are tailored to how we build roads, infrastructure, and signage in this country, which differs from how these things are done in Japan or Europe or China.
While an effort to harmonize FMVSS and infrastructure standards with other countries would be admirable and has been desired for a long time in the auto industry, the enormity of the undertaking is much greater than a single flippant comment (from someone who probably doesn’t even know what FMVSS stands for).
And in fact, US regulations already do allow for exemptions to many regulations for low volume vehicles. So it already is possible to build small cars in the US, at least if you build fewer than 2,500 per year. So a startup focused on tiny cars could already get started here, and could have been selling kei-like cars all along (say, TELO, for example… but even they are offering a 152in truck, a foot and a half longer than a kei car, and with 500hp, about 8x more than a kei car).
But why haven’t manufacturers made these cars already, then?
Again, going back to the above, regulations and manufacturers have both pushed vehicle sizes larger and larger, and consumer tastes have happily followed, with US drivers wasting more and more money and space on larger and more polluting vehicles.
There is a perception that these larger vehicles are safer (even though they aren’t, and we are currently nearing an all-time high in pedestrian fatalities), so if vehicles keep getting bigger as a result of regulations allowing them to, US consumers will be afraid to buy a car that’s even smaller than the smallest available today. And yesterday’s proposed rule explicitly claims, in its third paragraph, that smaller cars are undesirable for this reason (without recognizing that it’s actually the larger cars that are responsible this problem).
Kei cars are also typically less powerful than the average American car, which even Duffy claimed himself, saying “are they going to work on the freeways? Probably not” (even though most vehicles use about ~20hp to sustain highway speeds).
And given that the American consumer has been sold the dream of buying a vehicle not for what it will be used for, but for every conceivable purpose they could ever dream of using any vehicle for, it seems unlikely that many will line up for a car that they have been told can’t even get on the freeway.
After all, Smart cars did exist in the US, as have various other small vehicles, but they’ve always been marginalized, because the whole culture, manufacturing base and regulatory regime around cars and roads has been built to advantage large vehicles, not small ones.
So despite that microcar enthusiasts like myself want to see tiny cars in the US, the idea that manufacturers will suddenly scale up production of these vehicles in the US seems extremely unlikely without a concerted effort to show that they are welcome here and that there will be a market for them.
And I’m not convinced that concerted effort will be undertaken by people who are currently undertaking a concerted effort to do the exact opposite, and by someone who seems to change his mind with whatever stupid nonsense he happened to see 12 seconds ago on fox. Companies don’t build manufacturing facilities based on the whims of an idiot, they do so with clear and consistent policy that they can be certain will last through a vehicle model’s development and sales timeline (typically around ~14 years from start of development to end of production).
So I don’t think this is going to happen. Prove me wrong, I will be happy to eat crow here.
The 30% federal solar tax credit is ending this year. If you’ve ever considered going solar, now’s the time to act. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
-
Sports2 years agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports3 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Sports3 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment3 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment1 year agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024