CHAdeMO charging infrastructure is on its way out. If in the past you could find a charging station with CHAdeMO and CCS1 connectors in North America, now charging providers are prioritizing a NACS and CCS. So if you are an owner of a 1st or 2nd gen Nissan Leaf like me, should you consider a CCS to CHAdeMO adapter?
I’ve spent two months testing the charging adapter from Orientrise that lets older Nissan Leaf owners take advantage of CCS chargers, and the results were overall positive. I’ve found myself using my Leaf for drives that were previously impossible, because the number of CHAdeMO charging stations in my city is shrinking fast. Unlike a passive NAC-to-CCS adapter (or vice versa) that physically adapts the electrical contacts, the CHAdeMO adapter has a microchip inside that needs to translate communication protocols from the old CHAdeMO standard to modern CCS protocol.
It works flawlessly most of the time, and I was able to initiate sessions from DC charging stations from ChargePoint, IVY (Kempower), Electrify Canada (same as Electrify America), and others. But I did run into hiccups with a smaller charging provider using more proprietary hardware. But I think if you stick with larger and more established charging networks using commonly used hardware, the adapter will reliably let you charge.
The main drawback is cost. Early such adapters were easily over $1,000 USD, but now companies like Orientrise have reduced the cost to around $700. It is still A LOT of money for an adapter for an aging EV. In my opinion, if you have a 40, 50, or 62 kWh Nissan Leaf, then adapter could potentially be worthwhile. Because those Leafs have decent range, and will benefit from CCS infrastructure the most. You could realistically do smaller road trips with a CHAdeMO Leaf again.
But if you have a 24 kWh Leaf like me, the cost is harder to justify because the car needs to charge every 50-60 miles, and it will make very slow progress even with DC charging available.
The other thing to note is that this type of adapter requires an internal 18650 battery cell to function, and you must charge you charging adapter with USB-C in advance of charging your EV! Because, as I mentioned earlier, the adapter needs to power an internal computer to translate communications. I wish the adapter had the ability to trickle charge from the 400 V supply from the charging station, but right now it does not.
Overall, I think such an adapter could benefit 1st & 2nd gen Nissan Leaf owners looking to extend the useful life of their EV. Just because infrastructure providers are moving away from CHAdeMO does not mean these great little EVs need to be retired yet.
You can check out the adapter here:
CCS1 North America
CCS2 Europe
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