EV Charger Cable Theft Is On The Rise! Here’s Why There’s Almost No Benefit 

Like I have been saying for years. These jack wagons will work 10 times harder for a dishonest dollar than they would for an honest dollar.

They need to add a sense wire so that the station knows when the cable is cut. At that point it can sound a very loud alarm, which might discourage the perpetrator from cutting the rest of the cables at the site. It could also mark the station as offline so that people wouldn't expect it to be working when they showed up.

You can’t steal more cables if you no longer have any hands. 😂

Make the cables retractable. It won't come out without payment details loaded.

If copper were present in gas pumps and thieves attempted to steal it, authorities would likely impose immediate and stringent penalties, responding more swiftly to such incidents.

The only way this will be fixed is if the law is enforced. Once people start facing consequences for this it will become much less frequent.

Cable theft in the Seattle-area has gotten so bad that EVgo has said they won't bother replacing cables until the problem is solved. Starbucks HQ had their Chargepoint cables stolen and another nearby Starbucks-Volvo station had its cables cut within a week of the station opening.

Should I go to Seattle to film all of the EV chargers with cut cables? What do you think the solution is when the police are clearly not taking this seriously?

Copper theft has been an issue for years. It doesn’t matter how much copper is in it. Over 20 years ago my wife worked at a day care center that when they went to turn on the air conditioner that was in a fenced area when the HVAC person went too look at the unit it was just gone stolen for the copper. There is a bridge in Southern California I just saw a news article on that the local government can’t keep the street lights on because they keep stealing the wire. As someone who worked over 30 years in correctional facilities both county and state, I’m surprised it has taken so long for this to start. I personally would like to see statistics for other crime at these charging stations. If this isn’t an issue now, I almost guarantee it will be soon. Your appeal to would be cord cutters is at best naive. They don’t care, criminals are going too take your stuff, especially if it is just out in the open with little to no witnesses , that’s why San Francisco residents have stopped locking there cars that way the windows aren’t broken to rifle through their stuff. The Prius guy may just have an axe to grind because they make better looking cars too virtue signal with, or you just find it hard to believe a criminal drives a Prius. I think both Ed Kemper, and Ted Bundy drove VW bugs, when I was a kid that was the car hippies drove 😂

You keep saying that it’s not worth it - but at $15 each that was $60 worth of cables behind you. And while that’s not a lot on its own, what you need to look at is how much value you can extract for how little work. And cutting cables doesn’t take much effort - you can likely have those 4 cables cut in 10 minutes. Stripping the cables isn’t any work - I think you’re picturing thieves like this sitting with a knife and manually removing all of the sheathing, but that’s not how they do it - they dump the cables in a pit, pour some gasoline on them, and light them up. Once the fire is finished and the metal has cooled, you just pull it out and you take it to a scrap metal buying. Done. If you can cut, transport, and burn 10 cables in 2 hours, that’s the equivalent of making $75 an hour. I certainly don’t advise not condone anyone doing this - but for someone with little scruples who needs the extra income, this is a pretty easy (and with no action from the police, pretty safe) way to do that.

When theft and property damage that are worth thousands of dollars is something police departments don’t want to do anything about, unfortunately there is zero consequence to thieves and there is nothing stopping them.

kyle -- Reach out to the Puget sound / Seattle area state and city district attorney. You are a member of the press, and I think using your press credentials to pressure elected officials is a good idea. Maybe also reach out to Seattle area EV clubs and see what their perspective is.

My practical side is suggesting that the solution is for more surveillance and law enforcement involvement. My Murica side is saying that we counter theft or copper with expenditure of lead.

The cable should come out of the cabinet once payment is established.

EA should know instantly when a cable is cut. There is at least one temperature sensor in the connector, and obviously the reading for that sensor will go out of bounds when the cable is cut, if they don't already monitor it for that they should. (From that video of the Supercharger cables being cut we see that Tesla turns the light off on the charger about 15 seconds after the cable is cut.)

Why not add a wire loop in the cable. If it is cut, an alarm would go off. Either at the individual stations or at the whole site. Also turn on video cameras.

They should keep the cables energized ⚡

There are currently FOUR EA stations that are completely knocked out by this! Screw this guy, honestly.

EV charging is quite literally critical infrastructure and destruction of chargers should result in very harsh penalties. It's a shame police don't seem to care. Millions and millions of our tax dollars going to them just to get a "🤷‍♂️" is absolutely wild to me

This is reflective of a bigger issue in society which is the perception by many that theft and vandalism is acceptable. It starts early in life with either poor or no parenting and It is reinforced when there are no consequences for their actions.

It doesn't matter how many videos you make about this, don't expect thieves to have enough IQ to understand there is no benefit. When they steal, they don't think, but they see a thick cable and an opportunity, same when they steal anything else... Like a bag inside a car and they decide to break the glass... There is never a benefit, but there is no brain, except misleading rumors between thieves. It's like an infection that is impossible to stop.

Best way to stop it? Call your congress representatives, call your mayor, bring it up in town hall meetings. Push on your local leaders long enough and they’ll make it a priority.

I don't know if anybody else here has suggested this already (1000+ comments as I type this) but charger manufacturers might want to find a way to have at least some electrical current running through the cable at all times. When thieves are found lying on the ground with industrial wire snips next to them and that becomes an increasingly common phenomenon, problem solved.

if EV charging stations weren't isolated deserts devoid of anything that would encourage owners to hang around while charging, this would disappear instantly. i've only had my Kia Niro EV for 11 months and i'm aghast at how unwelcoming EVERY charging station i've ever seen is. no protection from weather, often stuck somewhere out of the way, etc. makes for the ideal site for unobserved theft.

Maybe it’s not about the copper, rather anti-EV

The fact California is *third* when it has by far the most EVs, the most chargers and the most population tells me that this is a very few people doing this on at least a semi-organized basis.

This reaction from Seattle police makes the “defund the police “ crowd sound more reasonable. Why pay for cops who refuse to do their job?

Make it a felony to damage a charger, once one guy is prosecuted it will stop.

1 Charging stations should have 4K security cameras fixed on their charging station lots. 2 Make the crime a felony for both state and federal courts. Charge them with both jail time AND a fine to the amount necessary to fix or replace the damaged chargers. 3 Retractable cables and plugs at all charging stations ... even destination chargers, I can't count how often I see these cables just laying all over the ground. I'd wager that most people doing this aren't doing it for money they are doing it because they don't like EVs or Tesla/Elon or specific EV stations.

You can bet the police would get involved if someone was cutting gas station hoses off

That station has two days worth of meth. Add to that, Grandma wont let them in her house anymore since they stole her jewelry.... That's why they are stealing them.

In Europe, except for DC chargers, people bring their own cables. You plug it into your car and the charger, tap your charge card, and the cable will lock into place.

The plugs have temperature sensors so the charger can immediately detect & report a cut cable. Maybe they should add indelible dye to the coolant on cooled cables.

Damage to infrastructure is prosecuted severly here in the UK. Because it affects society. The police in any given country have a duty to serve society, and go after criminals.

maybe they should charge the cable sheathes with thousands of volts.. 20K+ Volts actually. I was once a security guard and we guarded temp power lines. There where thieves that tried to steal these... the key word is "where" they took bolt cutters to them and the flash and explosion so violent that the guy was covered from head to toe with 3rd degree burns.

As a Soul EV owner, I feel the pain over the loss of Chademo. I used this very spot more than a few times over the years.

Why the hell isn’t this guy being identified, prosecuted, and jailed? Do felonies not count as important in Seattle? Not a place I would want to live if they don’t take felonies seriously. Why are they paying the cop’s salary if they do nothing?

The thieves are facing felony charges if caught due to the cost of the cables.

It would be such beautiful karmic justice if someone stole the catalytic converter from that guy's Prius. Hybrids are prime targets for that, after all. Universe, can we make this happen please? And yeah, it's not just Seattle PD I'm afraid. My dad just recently had an expensive e-bike stolen in San Diego (it was locked, they cut the cable). It has GPS tracking. He called and gave the cops an address...they told him they would take a report but otherwise are not going to do anything about it. We could go knock on the door, but they're just going to play stupid and at that point anything else we do would make _us_ the criminals. The sad fact is that most departments are not going to do shit about property crime these days, unless a cop happens to witness it. So while the guy may only be netting $8-15 per cable, he's able to do it with minimal effort and effectively _zero risk_ and it's therefore worth it to him. Criminals are not necessarily dumb.

It's not about the money it's about EV hate. The forums and social media comments can be complete vitriolic poison.

Your videos are solid, keep up the good work

I’ve been saying for years, apparently to deaf ears (including out of spec), that BEVs will not take off for the masses unless/until fast-charging stations convert to the gas-station model of having full-time attendants (with all the benefits that come with that, including restrooms, food, windshield-washing supplies, ability to pay by credit card and cash, to help handicapped & senior customers who have limited strength/mobility, ability to immediately fix or get repairs for a broken charger, and of course provide safety for both the chargers and the customers). And ubiquitous canopies to protect from rain and sunlight, as you have at most gas stations, is a necessity, not just a convenience. This current model of unattended chargers will fail if not changed, and mass adoption of BEVs will never take off without it; spending billions of dollars to build out charging stations in the unattended form is largely a waste of money ... it's best to spend a decent portion of that to build up the site of each charging station, not just throw in charging stations without the on-site support.

I live in Seattle and have definitely come across the cable theft problem, especially on public L2 chargers. It’s gotten to the point where it’s more surprising when a charger *hasn’t* been vandalized.

Imagine how fast the Police would investigate this if it turns out the cable thief doesn’t want to sell the copper but needs an untraceable source of copper for shaped charges.

This Video is 15 Minutes Long (Don't Get Use to It) Felt like there was an error with Out Of Spec Reviews video.

Yes, I agree with you that this is very aggravating for the EV drivers to pull up to a charging station and find the cable cut off. Thanks for mentioning that the small amount of copper and pricings a thieve would get on the wire really not beneficial for someone doing this. Some people must be very desperate and charging stations are easy targets. Someone should target the thieves and the buyers of the copper wire. Probably most copper wire sold to buyers are stolen wire. Evidently, as you say, the police do not want to get involved which is a shame. Theft is theft no matter what it is. And it is very disgusting. Myself, i only charge at home so I am not worried about having to go to a public charging station with my Tesla. But it is nice to be informed that this kind of theft is happening. Thanks for the video

Two possible solutions: Make the cables metal clad - harder to cut and more difficult to strip the cable, even with burning. Also, make them with aluminum conductors. Thieves would know they are aluminum when they pick them up and see how light they are. Yes, aluminum also has scrap value but much less than copper.

Same issue with catalytic converter theft, really no way to avoid it aside from patrolling and investigating. Catalytic converter thieves and criminal rings are caught.... eventually. Unfortunately, the City and County need to take it seriously before anything can improve. Otherwise, improved security and lighting is always a plus. The EA location in Federal Way WA had their cables cut recently, but that particular location is tucked away in the corner of a Walmart parking lot with no area lighting after hours and plenty of obstruction to block visibility. Far from secure in more ways than one.

To reduce the incidence of this kind of theft, replace the charger cables with aluminum cables! I suggested this a few weeks ago, and the most important disadvantage is that aluminum would be stiffer and heavier. Heavier because aluminum is 60% as conductive as copper. The stiffness can be addressed by using thinner strands in the cables. Might take a little engineering time to get it acceptably sleek.

EA should welcome the "cable theft" issue. They can now blame a legit reason why their charging stations never work.

Kyle, one thing you miss on this topic is that many live in an age of survival. Like catalytic exhaust component theft here in western Canada which are gone in 60 seconds these cables take a bit to cut yet is far easier compared to finding empty beverage containers in areas where recycling happens, to come up with $18 in recycling takes all day or longer. The world increasingly is a world of people who have nothing Vs people who wreck a cybertruck just because. Not saying there is anything wrong with wasting one's money but many people have this as a unreachable dream. Not saying you wreck vehicles just making the point that $18 worth in 60 seconds is a windfall for those who have nothing. It's not up to the police to secure cables, let charge point providers look after their property the same way store owners secure their stores with security. Bottom line it's a sad reality of today's world. Also, your RU-vid won't increase the thefts as most people who commit these thefts do not have the time to read messages like this.

What are users supposed to do if the police refuse to do their job?... vigilante justice?

On top of the little copper in there the Huber+Suhner DCFC cables also have nasty oil as coolant inside. Phoenix Contact cables can tell when they got cut off.

The drug users do not care what effects their actions have on anyone else. The only care is to make a small amount of money to feed their addiction. If any tesla users want to start parking teslas near the superchargers one week to get the evidence to get the person arrested and filing a group criminal case.

My community college in CA had 18 of 22 FREE chargers cut in the middle of the day. Full video, license plates, whole nine yards, Sheriff don't think anything will come of it even if they bothered to look for the people.

Well, if places like Seattle don't want to deal with them, then I'd have no issues with street justice being enacted on those damaging charging stations.

Maybe charge point operators should enclose the cable inside the unit until someone pays. There has got to be a better way to design the units with security in mind.

I own an EV that I use for around the town driving. In the three years I’ve owned it, I only charge at home. If they don’t solve this issue, I won’t be trading up to a longer range EV so I can go on road trips only to find charging stations that have been vandalized. This issue, unless resolved, will severely damage the EV industry. I know this might sound a bit crazy, but I wonder if oil companies are paying these pricks to do this. When it comes to the oil industry, I wouldn’t put it past them.

I seriously doubt this is theft. There are a lot of people who hate EVs. Vandalism is more probable explanation. Another reason to develop wireless charging and take the option for theft/vandalism out of the equation…

Yeah... cops in the PNW got their feelings hurt real bad during the pandemic and haven't worked since.

Thank you for once again solidifying the case for keeping my super efficient, very well maintained gas car as long as humanly possible.

If you change you camera's shutter speed, you should be able to eliminate the flickering screens and LED headlights.

I suspect it’s more about EV haters. Vandalism. Not copper acquisition/profiting. What about putting tracking tags into the cables?

Here in Stockton California there was a no-name charging station being put in at my local grocery store. The cables were cut even before they had their first customer. 😢

Store the cable inside the charger until the fee is paid and license plate ID'ed.

How come the local cops are not doing under cover work to catch these people

My local Seattle EV station had 3 of 4 chargers missing their cables just last week. Seattle and it’s no consequences DA’s, judges, school board, and voters are to blame and we’re now nearly as bad as San Fran and LA. Thanks for your efforts on educating about EV’s. Love our solar panels and Ioniq5.

Thieves won't care that it costs $2K+ to replace it. Thieves only care that they can turn a quick buck for the effort. If they can turn a net profit of even a buck, thieves will still cut it and steal it. There should be a sensing circuit added so that the removal of the cable fires off an alarm, preferably super-loud. At the same time, if there's no effort by the police to curb the theft, there will be no resolution. Police not caring about curbing the theft is an indication of the politics involved; people in the area voted for liberal policies, i.e. democrat soft on crime policies, and this is the result. VOTE DIFFERENT ! Honestly, if the owners cannot curb the theft, the solution may be to add in a few wires, that don't connect to anything, and pump high voltage thru the entire cable when not in use; shocking, but that may be what is needed in certain areas. Rampant theft is what is seen in these democrat controlled areas with soft-on-crime policies; it's now getting to the point where people have to take the law into their own hands to effect change. Reality is that it's time for a new government in these areas.

They need to stick an Apple Tag tracker in each cable…

Always wondered why they don't just have the wires pull into the station and have the handle lock to it till you paid. I imagine such large cables bending may be difficult, but it should still be possible.

If you live in an area that does not enforce the laws due to your politicians, this is what happens. You get what you vote for.

Sad to hear. Only way to stop it is to make these stations more visible like regular gas stations. Easy to cut a cable when the charger is behind a dumpster in the back.

Theres a brand new AAA site here in Vancouver, that had all the cables cut. Its been powered on for over a year, which is real smart with the cables just exposed. They REFUSE to take it off plugshare, chargepoint REFUSES to fix it, and AAA wont talk to anyone about it.

Hmmm. Seattle had one of the more violent "defund the police" events not too long ago. Since no human life or health is directly threatened, why should they put themselves in the position to face violence for enforcing a non-violent crime? I have family that lives up there, and I have heard comments that the police shouldn't be involved in crimes like these. After all, it is big corporations being hurt financially. I don't agree with this position, but I can understand the police feeling that, since the community doesn't want them involved, why should they? And 15 to 18 dollars per cable, means that someone can get their drugs after just hitting to charge points, 10 minutes cutting cables and 30 minutes stripping copper. They probably feel it's worth it.

I'm thinking more along the lines of sabotage than copper theft; perhaps a disgruntled technician or an extreme environmental activist (no cars are good cars).

Anyways, it's not exactly rocket science to how to add an alarm line to the cable, so that when it's cut it will turn on an alarm and immediately trigger a warning signal to the charger operator, who can then inform the police. Also, they should try and switch to aluminium wiring in the cables, even if it means a slight downgrade to maximum charge rates.

The UK definitely has the better idea when it comes to public charging: You have to bring your OWN cable and plug it into the station as well as your EV.

Although police are a critical component of ending this, if the local prosecutors shrug, that’s a big part of it too. Certain crimes are ignored and dismissed, by design.

Shielding or similar is not a great idea. As it is, charging cables are a bit unwieldy to handle. Therefore, adding some kind of shielding would make that worse. An option might be to put the cable in a reel inside the cabinet, but that would bulk the cabinet up much more than it is already, create another point of failure and be unique compared to what they are using to help with cable management, the cord to a spring loaded reel is standard for gas pumps meaning off the shelf and well-understood mechanics. This is a tough one to solve.

Maybe the solution is going to be connectors on both ends and everyone just brings their own cable

As a Seattle resident and EV owner, I am not happy that the cables are being cut here and the police are not doing anything about it. I am really glad to have a level two charger at home. I hope this becomes more than misdemeanor crime. Theft of cables here is truly disrupting an industry.

I remember when i was stuck in Newcastle on Tyne in England, heading up to Edinburgh, Scotland. Because some people lashed and brought down the overhead 25kv power cable up the track and stole the signalling wires too. At best they got like £2000 worth of copper but it took 12 hours of cancelled trains and £250,000 of new cables and labour to fit the new stuff, repair the gantries and splice and tension everything back together. All in all it cost millions to the economy and people wonder why our rail fares are expensive!!!

EV owners: "Defund the police" EV owners after the cable at the charging station gets cut: "why aren't the police doing anything?"

Its not the police that need to take this seriously - its the District Attorney. They are not prosecuting these crimes in Washington. It makes no difference if police arrest the guy, but then he is let go an hour later. They are just not prosecuting crimes in WA anymore.

How fast would the police respond if someone was cutting hoses off gas pumps?

Copper theft is a big problem all over. One response is to switch to aluminium cables which are bulkier, slightly lighter, but have zero scrap value. Don't forget to put lots of notices up calling out the use of aluminium cables, when switching to aluminium we need well informed criminals.

I believe that it is more politically motivated sabotage than economically motivated theft.

It's not just happening in the USA. We're seeing similar in the UK - in one town in Worcestershire (Kidderminster) a couple of weeks back, someone went round in one evening and cut 12 cables from all the rapid chargers in the town. I don't know if it's a cable theft grunt thing just for the copper or if it's EV haters / ICE obsessives who are doing it to try and penalise EV drivers. Some of them have been repaired by Osprey with new CCTV to catch them in the act, but there are still some chargers that are down (thankfully Zap-Map in the UK shows they're down - it's how I found out about it as I was travelling through that area and noticed lots of chargers showing offline - and then looked at the photos people had posted in the chat of severed cable stubs left...)

hi electrician here ive done rehabbing old factories for a bit now. copper thieves r the dumbest fuckers out there. theyll chop high voltage cable no matter if theres power or not.

The EV vs. Hybrid turf war is really heating up.

Retractable cables that lock into the stand until you login/purchase then it unlocks and you can pull it out. If the cable is cut during that time then sensors, alarms and cameras activate and whoever is logged in has their account locked and info given to police. Fake accounts will probably happen, but any increases in complications and hoops a criminal needs to jump through will reduce the number willing to do so. You can also add in some high strength difficult to cut security cabling inside as well making it extra difficult to cut through.

The cable as scrap is only a few dollars, yet costs thousands to replace. The thief would make more money stealing 1 or 2 trash bags of aluminum cans

Here is a way to fix it, that's not political.(which could fix it) Run a small gauge continuous wire looped through the cable that when a cable is cut it sends a open signal to the company and or device. At that point it can contact authorities, spray them with paint, pepper spray turn on surveillance cameras, really anything. You could even put a capacitor in the cable and shock the crap out of them. Just make sure you put warning labels on the chargers.

What we need to do is in cases of vandalism or petty theft the punishment should be a fine of 10 times the amount of damages done. The money to be put into a fund to compensate victims. If they don't pay then their paycheck should be garnished for as long as it takes.

I know a lot of ev owners don’t like the idea of superchargers looking like gas stations but. With out attendance there will always be vandalism. I’m not saying get rid of all parking lot stations but we need more charging hubs

Thieves will find a way to ply their trade. That's unfortunate. Thieves in a city near me stole copper gutters off a church. They also go under vacant houses and cut copper pipes. At $2000 for a cable, that affects the price of your service. Your insurance goes up. So you have to raise the price to the customer. It might be cost effective to have cameras installed high enough to be out of reach of thieves. Post conspicuous signage that security cameras are operating.

Simple solution just remove the cable. Just have an outlet and have the vehicle owner provide the cable. Which should be included when they buy the vehicle.

I live in Canada's east coast and in my province you have to show a valid government issued ID in order to sell copper. All the sales are tracked and logged so if there's any suspiciousness it can be traced!

It's far worse in Minnesota because mostly in Minneapolis where 90% of the cable thefts are happening where it got so bad that our government requires you to get a $200 permit to sell copper in the state which is harming the scrapping workers in the state due to the thefts.

Perhaps these stations should be redesigned so that the cable is rolled up inside the unit itself, or underground. Only when a form of payment is provided will the cable be released. Just a thought. At least the cable is not out in the open to be cut. Or charging stations should be located at gas stations where there are visible attendants on duty.