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Electric Vehicle Governance Framework: Interoperability

1st Apr, 2019

The UK is one of the largest markets for ultra-low emission cars in Europe, with a great ambition of developing one of the best Electric Vehicle (EV) charging networks in the world.

The benefits of EVs include mitigating damage from climate change and addressing air quality issues. Yet the uptake of EVs is slower than expected, primarily due to four reasons:

  • Market-level challenges around digital integration;
  • Accessing whole system value pools;
  • Lack of coordinated regulation; and
  • Uncertainty for large strategic investment into new products and services

To meet government targets and get ahead of the curve, the UK needs to drastically scale- up the uptake of EVs and supporting infra-structure – a challenge not just for government but for the EV market.

The Electric Vehicle Governance Framework (EVGF) consultation seeks views on the difficulties businesses face in generating sales and viable business models that deliver on government targets for EVs and deliver an exemplary market in the UK. Interoperability is key in achieving a just and rapid transition to new business models, innovative products and services that consumers love and embrace, whilst progressing on clean air compliance and climate change obligations.

There are many interoperability challenges that need addressing for the market to reach large sales and deliver solutions that scale nationally and globally. Interoperability between market sectors, their processes and technologies require a coordinated and industry led approach that delivers value for the market and consumers. For example, smart charging will be less effective if data between vehicles and the infra-structure cannot be exchanged.  How fast can the car charge and how much energy can the EV battery store? Without sharing this data, time of use tariffs will yield little benefit to the energy system and the consumer.

Consumers will often say that products and services need to be good value for money and convenient. The user experience is often the decisive factor in delivering sales and acceptance. However, many systems need to seamlessly interoperate to facilitate charging transactions to make their way onto the consumer energy bill while being able to drive up to any public charging point and plug-in.

Only the EV market as a whole will be able to address interoperability challenges at scale. In 2019 we invited you to participate in our EVGF Consultation. A copy of the consultation results are available below.

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