Every time we get new technology we seem to suffer a huge amount of waste of money and resources on competing standards.

The latest to appear is the connection for Electric Vehicles.

There are (at least) three such standards

JEVS G 105-1993

IEC 61851

SAE J1772

 

So what else is new? Computers went through the exact same thing, then VCRs, to a small extent DVDs, to a large extent Blu-Ray, and TVs. Everyone wants to be the one who owns the new standards, it is big money.

 

Well if you are interested in electric vehicles you now have a standards list of sorts.

 

Have you ever looked into the early days of automobiles, before they had settled on the gas engine? Steering wheels weren't standard either, neither was the clutch, break pedal or gas pedal.

These standards were set because they were the most popular, in the publics mind they worked the best. Now it is so firmly established that we can't imagine any other way.

 

And even after all these years we still have both petrol and diesel.

 

Well, as someone said in the Dark Ages of computing, referring to RS-232, "The nice thing about a standard is that there are so many of them!"

--Rich

 

What's worse is the spiderweb of standards that each standard references. Our 1 standard might reference 15 others that all need to be purchased/read to ensure your design is fully compliant.

Currently I design products for the telecom industry that must meet requirements in over 40+ standards (UL/CSA/IEC/EN/BS/ATIS/Telcordia and more). Many cost $1000 or more. Then we stick a shipping label on them that must meet another 10+ standards.. Then each of the larger companies we deal with has their own internal 30+page shipping standards that must be met.
I bet we have payed more than $100,000 in standards.