Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and BMW of North America have joined forces to explore the potential of vehicle-to-everything technology. The collaboration is underway and builds on earlier smart charging schemes launched by the companies.
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General Motors announces expanding its ‘Ultium Charge 360’ service into a holistic ecosystem. The new Ultium Home and Ultium Commercial brands combined with EV charging now form the dedicated business unit GM Energy which integrates all charging needs in line with the grid.
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In California, USA, Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Tesla have launched a new pilot program that creates a virtual power plant (VPP) to help support electric grid reliability. Customers who who contribute energy from their Tesla Powerwalls earn money from what they feed into the grid.
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In California, Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) and Ford have announced a vehicle-to-grid (V2G) collaboration. In the pilot project, PG&E and Ford will test the F-150 Lightning and its Intelligent Backup Power bidirectional charging capabilities in powering customer’s homes in PG&E’s service area.
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In the USA, Pacific Gas and Electric and General Motors have announced a collaboration to pilot the use of GM electric vehicles as on-demand power sources (vehicle-to-grid, V2G). PG&E and GM aim to test the pilot’s first vehicle-to-home capable EV and charger by summer 2022.
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WattEV is building a pilot electric truck stop in California’s San Joaquin Valley, positioned near logistics fulfilment centres run by Amazon and Walmart. The mega-watt charging site will feature a solar micro-grid with battery storage, plus grid energy from PG&E.
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Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and the BMW Group are expanding their partnership focused on smart charging electric vehicles with excess renewable energy to support grid reliability.
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The North American infrastructure provider was selected as an approved vendor for Pacific Gas and Electric’s (PG&E) EV Fleet programme. Under the programme, PG&E customers can receive free EV charging infrastructure, as well as funding for EVs and additional chargers.
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The California regulation board has approved new projects by local energy providers to expand the local charging grid for the value of 768 million dollars. The state of New York is also accelerating their charging infrastructure expansion.
Read moreFunding: The UK government announced a 20m pound subsidy programme for electric mobility in the cargo and logistics sector. The money will be distributed to 20 companies to introduce low-emission and zero-emission vehicles. More than 40 companies had a applied for the grant.
businessgreen.com, edie.net, gov.uk
Cheaper charging: From today, the South Korean government has cut the cost of electricity used to charge a vehicle, to incentivise people even further to purchase an EV. The price used to be at 313.1 won per kWh (0.26 USD) and has been lowered to 173.8 won per kWh (0.15 USD). The country will also see 530 new fast-chargers installed this year.
koreajoongangdaily.joins.com
Clean Fuel Rebate: California utility Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) now offers its EV driving customers a so-called “Clean Fuel Rebate” of 500 dollars. The company is passing on money from California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard programme, which gives credits to utilities whose customers use home electricity to charge electric cars. Moreover, PG&E plans to install 7,500 EV chargers in California.
greencarreports.com
Annual closure: Dutch infrastructure provider says revue grew to 81,382 euros in the fourth quarter of 2016, a 174 percent increase to same period in 2015. The number of kWh charged meanwhile increased by 209 percent, reaching 168,381 kWh in Q4. The operator also says it lowered the price per kWh at its chargers, as well as its monthly standard fee.
fastned.de
U.S. manufacturer Flyer delivered a total of 213 electric buses this past year, marking an increase of 48 percent compared to 2015. And with an estimated 255 equivalent units of heavy-duty transit bus deliveries to have been zero emission in 2016, Flyer contributed 83 percent.
electriccarsreport.com, edmontonjournal.com
Ikea ChargeLounge: Ikea Germany has its first ChargeLounge that has been developed together with Fraunhofer IAO. It has been installed at a parking lot at the furniture store in Ludwigsburg. Customers can charge with AC or DC while the lounge is a modular box that can serve as showroom or café.
idw-online.de
Fuel cell deal: Ballard Power Systems signed a Long-Term Sales Agreement (LTSA) with Polish Solaris for the sale and supply of fuel cell modules. An initial order is for ten 85 kW FCveloCity-HD fuel cell modules, with deliveries planned to start in 2017.
greencarcongress.com
When in Rome promote electric vehicles. Nissan teamed up with Italian football club AS Roma to showcase its EV offering. Apart from the Leaf, the e-NV200 Evalia will serve as shuttle at the stadium. At the Trigoria training centre, another Leaf and e-NV-200 vehicles will transport people and goods.
carscoops.com
NYC stands behind the Bolt: New York City signed a deal with GM to supply the Chevy Bolt. The order will help the city to reach its 1,000 EVs by 2017 target, which has been laid out in the NYC Clean Fleet scheme. The Bolt is to play a “pivotal role” according to NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio, who did not go into further detail. 50 Bolt have however been ordered to take part in a shared fleet initiative and are expected to arrive in spring 2017.
einnews.com, uaw.org
Mapping charging demand: Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) collaborated with researchers at the PHEV Research Center at the University of California, Davis and developed best practices for siting DC fast chargers. The findings were applied to feed an interactive map.
businesswire.com, pge.com (map, log in required)
European charge network grows: Hubject has extended its Intercharge network to include a few hundred stations of partners in Norway, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, France and Switzerland. New partners are Fortum, Gronn Kontrakt, Virta, Clean Charge, Swisscom, ESB, and Freshmile.
marketwired.com
Charging cloud: ABB and Microsoft jointly launched a new platform for EV fast-charging. It combines ABB’s EV charging stations with Microsoft’s Azure cloud-based services that include machine-learning and predictive analytic capabilities. The platform is presented at eCarTec.
news.microsoft.com
7,500 EV chargers in California is the revised plan of Pacific Gas and Electric as its initial idea to erect 25,000 EV charging stations in the Golden state had been rejected by the California Public Utilities Commission (we reported).The plan still sees opposition by private infrastructure providers.
greentechmedia.com
EV chargers in Lapland: The Fortum Charge & Drive network will be expanded with seven new charging stations in northern Lapland in Finland. The 22 kW semi-fast chargers are erected in cooperation with Renault and are located close to the border with Norway.
globenewswire.com
Home charging: Leviton presented the Evr-Green Mini Level 2 EV charging station. Very compact, the station comes standard with a 12-foot and optional 18-foot cable, and works with 30 amp circuits.
electriccarsreport.com
Executive order to electrify: U.S. President Barack Obama intends to reduce the government’s CO2 emissions by 40 percent until 2025 compared to levels in 2008. He has therefore issued an Executive Order to Federal Agencies to electrify a fifth of their fleet by 2020. Until 2025, 50 percent of all new official vehicles are to be either all-electric or plug-in hybrids.
greencarcongress.com, ngtnews.com, whitehouse.gov
Public electrification: Chinese Transport Minstry last week announced its plan to add 200,000 buses and 100,000 taxis powered by alternative fuels, including electricity, until 2020. Last year alone, 15,000 “alternative fuel-powered” buses were added to China’s public transport services.
autoblog.com
German Mayors for mobility: Three cities in Lower Saxony, namely Brunswick, Wolfsburg (where VW is from), and Salzgitter together developed a strategic paper outlining ways to improve mobility in the region. Not only public transport is to intensify in frequency and connectedness but also new rental stations for electric vehicles and bicycles are part of the plan.
braunschweigeranzeiger.de (in German)
Unlikely match: Nissan has teamed up with gas station provider Ricker’s to expand its “No Charge to Charge” programme to Indianapolis. EV charge stops will be conveniently located at Ricker’s fuel stations and convenience stores while Nissan provides two years of free charging to Leaf owners.
automotiveworld.com
Credits to rebates: Pacific Gas and Electric Co. proposed an one-off rebate for customers driving electric cars. The rebate needs to be approved by the California Public Utilities Commission as PG&E plans to use money earned from selling carbon credits to oil companies.
sfgate.com
Bid for 3,000 e-trikes: The Philippine’s Department of Energy (DOE) has opened the bidding process for 3,000 electric tricycles through an Asian Development Bank-funded project.
businessmirror.com
PlugSurfing investor: Cleantech Invest is taking a stake of 3.45 percent in the Berlin-based start-up which connects charging infrastructure providers in five European countries with one app. PlugSurfing intends to use the money to expand internationally.
globenewswire.com
Chargemaster North is the name of a new Chargemaster business division formed to serve customers in the North East and North West of England, as well as Scotland. Headed by Alexandra Prescott, the operation will be based in Newcastle.
electriccarsreport.com
Dancing with the devil? PG&E has installed ten EV charging stations at the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant in California, another 12 stations are planned. The chargers are part of the utility’s providers plan to eventually install 25,000 such charging stations in California.
sanluisobispo.com
250 million dollars for EVs: At an event at the White House, two new initiatives have been launched. More than 70 utility providers plan to invest over 250 million dollars in EVs to electrify their fleets. PG and the Edison Electric Institute furthermore announced a new initiative for the ‘Workplace Charging Challenge’ the DoE had called for.
electriccarsreport.com, cnn.com
New Mexico e-fleet: The Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM) plans to replace most of its vehicles, possibly all 450, with plug-in electric vehicles. For a start, seven vehicles will be acquired, with six pick-ups and ten bucket trucks to follow within the next few weeks.
abqjournal.com
H2 station at Memphis airport: Plug Power has completed installation of its first GenFuel hydrogen infrastructure at the Memphis Airport. The GenFuel station includes a hydrogen tank, compression system, fuel pipelines, and hydrogen dispensers that will power a fleet of 15 airport tugs.
aviationpros.com
American Football goes electrically: ChargePoint provided ten Atlanta Falcons-branded charging stations to the team at various training facilities. Atlanta is the second biggest EV market in the U.S. after California.
bizjournals.com
Cheaper charging stations in Hong Kong: Hong Kong Productivity Council and Chinese ITE Engineering have locally developed low-cost fast-charging stations to be installed at two government facilities in Hong Kong, adding to another ten already existing imported ones in Hong Kong.
thestandard.com.hk, chinadaily.com.cn
Truck with power to spare: PG&E and Efficient Drivetrains Incorporated now introduced two jointly developed plug-in hybrid trucks designed for utility providers. With 120 kW exportable power, one of the trucks can provide enough energy to keep the lights on in a neighbourhood while crews are trying to fix whatever problem has caused an outage.
electriccarsreport.com, puregreencars.com
Internet of Energy: Within EU-funded ‘Internet of Energy for Electric Mobility (IoE)’ project, Siemens is developing solutions for even smarter grids. One of the technologies the company works on, is the integration of EVs into the energy management systems of large buildings.
idw-online.de, phys.org
Busy Akasol: The battery manufacturer just sealed a deal with the British bus builder Alexander Dennis London (ADL) to supply Li-ion batteries for London’s plug-in double deckers. The battery packs consist of 30 modules, which allow for a charging power of up to 170 kW and can store 61.2 kWh of energy. Just recently, Akasol had delivered battery systems to Bombardier to be deployed in four bendy buses by Solaris that will serve in the German city of Brunswick (we reported).
busnetz.de (in German)
Porsche 918 Spyder on fire: One of the 918 hybrid super cars in existence has caught fire at a gas station in Toronto, Canada. What has caused the fire is not clear yet but witnesses speak of overflowing fuel, which might have been ignited by the hot exhaust system.
blog.caranddriver.com, youtube.com (video)
Most clicked link on Monday was the announcement of Volkswagen’s plug-in Passat GTE to be presented in Paris next week.
carscoops.com
