Liquid-cooled Superchargers Are Less Unwieldy, Faster Charging

Elon Musk has cornered the market on EV charging with his fast and free Supercharger network, which , Tesla can top off an 85 kWh Model S in about an hour. As fast as the Superchargers are though, there’s plenty of room for improvement, starting with the use of liquid-cooled cables, which aren’t just smaller and lighter, but they may also be able to charge faster too.

ChargedEVs reports on a little-mentioned factoid from the recent Tesla shareholder meeting, the slow rollout of liquid-cooled cable lines. The first set was installed at the Mountain View Supercharger station, which are smaller and lighter than even the Level 2 destination chargers Tesla has been rolling out at select locales. While the obvious benefits of an easier-to-handle cable can’t be understated, these liquid-cooled cables may also be able to deliver more power during charging.

Most Supercharger stations operate at 120 KW, though some go as high as 135 KW…too high for the current Model S to handle. But Musk said at the shareholder meeting that it’s “possible” in the “long term” that this technology could deliver even more power through Supercharger stations. If Tesla can get the time down to 30 minutes, or even less, that’d really take a lot of wind out of arguments about charging taking too long. Keep an eye out for liquid-cooled Tesla Superchargers near you.