ChargePoint Taking Orders For NACS Cable Retrofit Kits

When it comes to the transition to NACS in North America, access to Tesla’s Supercharger network has been the main topic of discussion. This comes naturally, as the Supercharger network has not only proven itself to be very reliable, but to generally just have a lot more locations in a lot more places.

But there’s another element to this story that’s sometimes just as important or even more important: adoption of NACS by other charging networks. While it’s true that Tesla has an edge over basically everybody for geographic spread, there are still places where the only fast charging stations don’t say “T三SLA” on them. One great example of this is the station in the picture at the top of this article. Located in Roswell, New Mexico (this photo was from before they put a roof over it), this station is the only one nearby that works for drivers of any EV.

So, it’s also big news when other companies start to offer a NACS plug, because this makes life easier and often cheaper for Tesla drivers, and offering native NACS support means nobody needs to carry an expensive adapter.

Fortunately, ChargePoint is now taking orders for NACS cable retrofit kits, but before you go and place an order, keep in mind that there are two or maybe even three types of retrofit cables. First off, there are those meant for Level 2 stations and those meant for DC fast charging (Level 3). To make things even more complicated, the cables meant for home charging stations and those meant for commercial Level 2 stations like you’d find in a parking lot are likely different, too.

If you’re the owner of a commercial station, you should probably contact your ChargePoint representative or reseller to order a NACS retrofit. You’ll either need to replace the CCS or the CHAdeMO plug and cable, or you could likely swap out both for NACS. But, for now, it’s probably a good idea to switch only one cable out so that you have the two most popular plugs (CCS1 and NACS), and then migrate to all-NACS in a few years if you see that the CCS is never used. For Level 2 commercial stations with two J1772 ports, swapping out one for NACS probably makes sense, too.

If you have a home ChargePoint station with a J1772 connector, and you want to switch it to NACS (because you bought a NACS car), you can order that part for yourself here. But, if you have a J1772 car, there’s no reason at all to do this yet. It’s probably best to wait and let the people who actually need the retrofit get one.

For Tesla drivers looking to fast charge at one of these new non-Tesla NACS stations, it’s also important to keep in mind that your vehicle must have CCS adapter support for it to work. Most newer Tesla vehicles offer this from the factory, but if you have an older one that can only speak the Supercharger language, you’ll need to get your vehicle upgraded to speak NACS (which is CCS, at least electrically).

Featured image by Jennifer Sensiba.