Companies push electric cars

The international alliance was initiated last November by electricity company RWE and Daimler. As early as April there should be European agreement on the basic characteristics of the charging infrastructure. Full agreement is necessary before investments worth billions of euros will start rolling towards electric transportation.

Besides initiator Daimler, most important car manufacturers have joined the initiative. BMW, Volkswagen, Renault-Nissan, PSA, Volvo, Ford, Toyota, General Motors, Mitsubishi and Fiat are all in. On the electricity production side, next to RWE, Eon, EnBW (Germany), Vattenfall (Sweden), Electricité de France, Electrabel (Belgium), Enel (Italy), Endesa (Spain), EDP (Portugal) and Essent (the Netherlands) have joined the alliance.

“Most issues have already led to agreement,” says Carolin Reichert of RWE. “However, there are a few issues where there are still different opinions.

”Formal standards must be laid down by a council of representatives, which can take up to years. As companies are unwilling to wait for that, they will opt for de facto standardisation instead, which must lead to formal standards in the near future. “We need planning security for our investments as soon as possible,” says Reichert.

The energy companies and Daimler expect a potential of around 2.5 million electric vehicles (EVs) on the German roads by 2020. For Germany alone, to prepare electricity and charging infrastructure, around EUR 3.5 million will be needed until 2030. Charging stations need to be amply available, as well as smart enough to deal with the various types of batteries around by then.

Setting standards is where cooperation ends, though. Building charging stations and developing initial markets for EVs will be done by various smaller alliances. However, it is possible that roaming models, analogue to the cell phone model, will enter the stage, which gives users access to competing operators’ infrastructure at a certain cost.

It is expected that today (Thursday), the Franco-German Council of Ministers will instigate a working group in which government and industry representatives from both countries will take seat. This working group should bring closer cooperation between the two countries in working towards clean drive-train technologies.

Important questions
Various questions need to be answered by the working group, such as:

• What should the connector look like?
• Should cars be equipped with their own cables or should cables be available at the charging station?
• How to physically protect charging infrastructure from weather influences and vandalism?

Other questions relate to the paying system and the maximum charging capacity of the grid.

Agreed upon
Participating stakeholders have already reached agreement on some core issues. A universal, safe, and easy-to-use connector will be developed, which must be able to cope with currents of 230 V/16A up to 400 V.

Original article (German)

• Konzerne schieben Elektroauto an