About 30–42 million chargers will be needed by 2030 to support the adoption of EVs. One of the primary challenges in deploying more chargers is the installation process. Any activity which requires plugging into the energy grid normally comes with lengthy permitting processes. And there is often additional scrutiny and delays from utilities in ensuring they have capacity to safely provide the required kilowatts.
To better understand this problem from the lens of founders actively solving for it everyday, we spoke with Tiya (COO @ itselectric) and Zak (CEO @ ChargeLab). Both pointed towards understanding and utilizing the existing energy capacity in the built environment.
it’s electric chargers are powered directly from buildings. “Instead of pulling power from the utility, we pull our power from buildings where it is already metered at the right level,” says Tiya. “We run power directly from the spare capacity in the electric panel directly to a charger on the curbside and then that becomes a public charger.” This approach makes it’s electrics time to deploy a charger days rather than the normal months. And it has made it easier for their city government partners to begin offering L2 charging in urban environments.
ChargeLab has built a software intelligence layer to manage a charging portfolio. This helps chargepoint owners get more out of a limited energy profile. “It enables a building that only has enough power for 10 EVs to install 50 chargers and use our software to do load balancing,” says Zak. This is especially important for condos and office buildings which were not designed to house the equivalent of 50 additional appliances on their energy load.