OCPI e-mobility roaming: ElaadNL successful in testing the Open Charging Network

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Summary:

Electric mobility is exponentially growing but there are still challenges remaining for the upcoming mass market. eRoaming - the easy accessibility of all charge points - being one of them. In order to support an effortless e-mobility experience by developing secure and smart software solutions, ElaadNL and Share&Charge Foundation have successfully tested the Open Charging Network.

The Open Charging Network is an open-source solution which enables Charge Point Operators and eMobility Service Providers to communicate securely and efficiently for a better charging experience for electric vehicle drivers. Following this test, the Open Charging Network is now available for all industry players.

Full Press Release:

Electric mobility is exponentially growing but there are still problems remaining for the upcoming mass market. eRoaming - the easy accessibility of all charge points - being one of them.

In their joint mission of supporting an effortless e-mobility experience by developing secure and smart software solutions, ElaadNL and Share&Charge have successfully tested the Open Charging Network.

The Open Charging Network allows Charge Point Operators and eMobility Service Providers to communicate with each other at no cost and very low internal efforts. “It is comparable to email” explains Christopher Burgahn, Head of Product at Share&Charge. “You just connect once to one email client and you can send messages to everybody in the world. The same goes here, if a CPO or eMSP is connecting to one node via OCPI, they can offer eRoaming charging services with all other parties connected”. Thus, every company which is OCPI 2.2. compliant can save cost and make use of applications built on top of the “Open Charging Network”.

ElaadNL successfully tested the setup and running of the Open Charging Network node. That node is now also available to the public to be used for testing purposes. The node is connected via OCPI to the Driivz backend. The full integration of the node, OCPI, Driivz and the charge stations were successfully tested. The first car is already fully charged using the new system!

Harm van den Brink from ElaadNL: “We have been in contact with Share&Charge for years now. We followed their work since the early days, when it was still all fully running on blockchain. It’s good to see that now they use the blockchain for what it is for, and still use OCPI and/or other protocols to do what those are the best at. I think the combination and integration of all the different technologies is what makes this a great new development”.

The Open Charging Network has also been tested by other strong industry partners like innogy eMobility Solutions and parties are now invited to use the open-source solution. “It is great to see that we have the first contributions from the global open source community towards the OCN. This allows us to get the best ideas and achieve the highest quality software. We believe that open source technology is the best way for building an eRoaming network, which is such a crucial part for many charging services” Micha Roon, CTO of Share&Charge states.

About ElaadNL:

Knowledge and innovation center ElaadNL researches and tests the possibilities for Smart Charging: reliable, affordable and sustainable charging of electric cars. ElaadNL is an initiative of the joint Dutch grid operators.

About the Share&Charge Foundation:

The Share&Charge Foundation is an independent non-profit organization. Supported by strong members from the e-mobility industry the purpose is to enable open innovation for a better electric vehicle charging experience. For this, the foundation is curating the “Open Charging Network” - a software solution based on the standard OCPI for secure and low-cost eRoaming.

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