This week, Tesla is rolling out the third generation of its Supercharger and with it the promise of recharging its electric vehicles significantly faster.
Posting on the Tesla blog, Tesla explains that V3 Supercharging requires a brand new 1MW power cabinet be installed at Supercharging locations. Once operational, it allows an electric vehicle to recharge at up to 250kW, which translates to 1,000 miles per hour, or 75 miles of charge in just five minutes.
This is good news for Tesla owners, but also for Tesla's network because it means cars will spend on average 50 percent less time recharging, meaning every Supercharging location can handle more cars every day. Tesla believes charging times using the V3 Supercharger will fall to around 15 minutes per vehicle, which at peak rates means 225 miles of charge is replenished.
The ability to charge more vehicles per day is further enhanced by the fact the new cabinet doesn't require the power to be shared with another vehicle in the next stall, so both cars can reach the peak 250kW output at the same time.
The good news for Tesla owners doesn't end there, though. A new feature is being added to vehicles called On-Route Battery Warmup. Every time you travel to a Supercharger location your Tesla will register that and intelligently warm up the battery to the optimal temperature to accept a charge when you arrive. This small tweak means an average reduction of 25 percent to charge times.
Access to V3 Superchargers will happen gradually with Tesla starting by installing them in the Bay Area. Initially, only the Model 3 will be abale to take advantage of them, but Model S and Model X vehicles will receive an over-the-air software update in Q2 to add support. For now, the focus is on North America, but Europe and Asia-Pacific regions will begin to get V3 Superchargers in Q4.