Vector and Chargetrip Partner to Ease Anxiety Amongst EV Owners at Busy Charging Stations

New Zealand's EV Owners are getting a welcome boost from New Zealand's largest Energy distributor Vector who has teamed up with Dutch start-up Chargetrip.

Range Anxiety vs Charge Anxiety

Range anxiety is a term often used to describe the stress EV users experience when their destination is or could be further than their car battery’s range, and they fear they could end up stranded on the side of the road. Charge anxiety is caused by the uncertainty of waiting lines at charge stations. Both are considered major barriers keeping people from switching to electric driving.

To put more control and freedom in the hands of EV users, Vector and Chargetrip are adapting a popular EV journey planning app for the New Zealand market, that equips EV drivers with journey planning information that is tailored to them, their trip, and their EV.

Topography and Weather will be taken into account when calculating range

The app is based on the popular Chargetrip service used by more than 50,000 EV drivers in Norway—which has the largest number of EV users per capita in the world. The app will offer Kiwi EV drivers route planning and navigation guidance, suggesting the optimal charge stops along the way.

To help fund the app’s adaptation to the New Zealand market, Vector and Chargetrip have been awarded a grant from Elemental Excelerator (Elemental)—a growth accelerator that has funded more than 50 projects globally.

Vector’s Group Chief Executive Simon Mackenzie said, “We are thrilled to be partnering with Chargetrip, with support from Elemental, to create a tool that improves the overall experience for EV owners, who we know have very different needs compared to drivers of internal combustion engines.

“Vector has long been committed to stimulating and facilitating uptake of EVs in New Zealand and we have a network of EV chargers in Auckland. We have invested in new EV related technologies such as Vehicle-to-Home, which allows EV’s to become mobile sources of energy and we are now excited to be working towards improving the user experience for EV drivers,” Simon said.

The app will also inform people about their CO2 savings per journey and will be compatible with every EV type regardless of make, model or configuration.

The app will include information for public charging locations throughout New Zealand, their availability (to help avoid queues), as well as real-time assessment of the environmental factors that can impact EV batteries, such as topography and temperature.

It will utilise data from NZ Transport Agency’s EVRoam database of public EV charging infrastructure. EVRoam collects data directly from electric vehicle charging infrastructure providers and freely distributes it to a wide range of transport maps, apps and websites.

Chargetrip's CEO Gideon van Dijk said, “Electric mobility is a crucial catalyst in the renewable energy transition. We are excited to partner with Vector and Elemental, who both have an impressive track record at moving the needle. Range anxiety, waiting lines, and complex logistics are some of the biggest hurdles to rapid EV adoption. We are committed to solving these barriers and empowering drivers to make the switch to a cleaner transportation.”

Ramsay Siegal, Elemental Excelerator’s Managing Director said, “We are proud to partner with Vector, a global leader in energy innovation, and help Chargetrip scale its pioneering smart navigation technology. This project is a perfect example of how startups and utilities can collaborate for transformative change, and we're excited to share lessons from New Zealand to support faster EV adoption worldwide.”

ORIX New Zealand has launched a new initiative—ORIX NZ EVi—aimed at pushing electric vehicles into NZ fleets. 

They are now offering a programme where businesses with 16 or more lease vehicles on an ORIX Sole Supply agreement the opportunity to upgrade one of their fleet’s vehicles to a selected electric vehicle at the same lease rate as the fossil fuel equivalent. This has become possible, thanks to co-funding from the Government's Low Emission Vehicles Contestable Fund, administered by the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA) 

The Orix NZ EVi programme will include the installation of an AC charging unit at the business premises free of charge and provide opening charging credit.

The aim for the project is to remove many of the barriers businesses face when attempting to incorporate an electric vehicle into their fleet.

ORIX has seen increasing interest in adding electric vehicles to fleets but they claim the reality is that the majority of those businesses are reluctant to invest the higher upfront costs. By removing the additional cost of an electric vehicle, the cost of the charging unit and by handling most of the admin, ORIX is hoping to eliminate the barriers. This will integrate electric vehicles into a wider range of businesses over a three year period, giving them the opportunity to experience and fully evaluate an electric vehicle for their organisation.

The Better NZ Trust agrees with Orix and EECA, of the importance of getting electric cars into business fleets. This will ensure a flourishing second-hand EV market in the years to come, making sustainable transport affordable for a wider range of NZers. 

[Rachelle Tilsley - 10 Feb 2019]

image supplied by Orix NZ

Good infrastructure is seen as essential to the promotion of EV sales and use in NZ. 

image PAUL SHERLEY/BMW NZ

[David Linklater - Stuff - 30 Jan 2019]

The latest round of the Government's Low Emission Vehicles Contestable Fund has once again thrown the spotlight on New Zealand's charging infrastructure.

The fund, which provides up to $7 million per year to contribute up to half of project costs to promote the uptake of Electric Vehicles (EVs), named Ngai Tahu Tourism as one of its recipients.

Partnering with ChargeNet, Ngai Tahu will install DC fast chargers at key tourist spots including Franz Josef Glacier, Queenstown and Glenorchy.

British driver Sam Bird wins at Santiago for the Envision Virgin Racing team, making him the only driver to have a win in every season of Formula E.  Unaware that he was under investigation for being underweight during his post-race weigh-in, he accepted his trophy and fortunately was eventually cleared.

On the podium it was (1^st) Sam Bird (Envisage Virgin Racing), (2^nd) Pascal Wehrlein (Mahindra Racing), (3^rd) Daniel Abt (Audi Sport ABT Schaeffler). Abt also got the points for fastest lap, and received one of the five fanboosts.

EV-Sales is a blog created by Jose Pontes, which tracks plug-in (PEV) sales all over the world, ranking countries and manufacturers by sales.

It's a labour-intensive job, with some countries, like NZ, freely publishing this raw data, but in others the data can sometimes be very difficult to come by. Nevertheless, he manages to produce data on about 80 models in 40 markets, twice a year.  When the #LeadingTheCharge team are looking for sales data of NZ-new PEV, this has been a major source of information for us, and therefore probably of interest to our 13,000 registered members.

Leading The Charge now boasts a Membership of 13,000.

NZ's 2018 EOY has just been published at EV-Sales. In summary, New Zealand is +31% for December 2018 compared to December 2017, and +56% for yr-2018 compared to yr-2017. I'll transcribe the New Zealand specific results in full below this introduction. 

Meanwhile, the EV-Sales blog is a subset of EV-Volumes. EV-Volumes, based in Sweden, collects data on more than just sales. They are tracking: Products, prices, batteries, charging infrastructure, regulations and incentives globally. A quote from their website, reads:

"We share a passion for EVs and their ability to make life easier and more sustainable.  EVs offer unmatched energy efficiency, operating cost and cleanness. We believe in their potential to make automobiles the most entertaining, comfortable, purposeful and affordable we ever had.

"Finding the facts in this emerging, dynamic industry can be very time consuming, often impossible. And it is not likely to be your core business either. We made it ours and want to share our knowledge with you."

 

Just a few important notes to keep in mind when reading this data.

1. It is important to differentiate between sales and total fleet numbers. This is a record of sales year-on-year, not total fleet numbers. So while NZ may be heading towards a 3% of national fleet in new registrations, that does not necessarily mean we have 3% of the total fleet. 

2. NZ's vehicle market is largely driven by used imports. Our biggest selling PEV is the Nissan LEAF. In 2018, these were 100% imported, so don't win a podium spot. Though rumour has it that Nissan will begin selling NZ-new LEAFs in mid-late 2019.

3. While to NZ'ers low-speed vehicles may seem unimportant, from a global climate POV, they are terribly important when used in high population density countries like China and India. The shift to electric NEV in these huge numbers is gradually making a positive impact on inner-city pollution in China. This is especially so, in those regions of China which generate largely renewable sources of electricity to power them.

[Rachelle Tilsley - Leading The Charge - 26 Jan 2019]

Holiday parks in New Zealand are putting their money where their mouth is with the installation of 54 electric vehicle charge points in 24 holiday parks around the country, encouraging the use of electric vehicles.

Fourteen holiday parks in the North Island and 10 in the South Island are now offering 22kW AC charge points, which provide relatively fast charge for vehicles in lieu of installing expensive DC chargers.

Unable to wait on government, Vector has begun publishing its own series of Guides on EV Charging. The first much-needed guide will be aimed at multi-dwelling complexes. This how-to guide is designed to make it easier for tenants and residents of business, commercial and apartment buildings to install EV charging facilities. 

Lines company, Vector Limited is New Zealand's leading electricity distributor and is largely owned by Auckland householders, via Entrust.

“EV popularity continues to skyrocket, with the number of EVs on New Zealand roads almost doubling year-on-year,” said Vector’s Head of Engineering, Cristiano Marantes.

“By demystifying the process and making it easier for people to charge their EVs, we expect to see to see more businesses adopt them as part of their company fleet,” he said. 

[Alex Stone - Waiheke Weekender - 10 Jan 2019]

The goal for the recently announced initiative on Waiheke, "Electric Island", is for a totally clean island in terms of transport and power supply by 2030.

In an article in Waiheke Weekender, dated 10 January, local EV Owner, Alex Stone, talks to other Islanders including The Better NZ Trust's own Carl Barlev, and the owners of Easy Transport, a (nearly) EV-only taxi service on the island.

Read Full Article here.

NZ EV Registrations: Just Shy of 12K mark

Figures released yesterday by the Ministry of Transport have final numbers of electric vehicles registered in NZ as of 2018 year-end at 11,748. This comfortably exceeds the Government's target of 8,000. 

Continuing the trend, light electric far outweighs heavy EV. Interestingly though, BEV has more than double the number of registrations as PHEV on an increasing trend year on year.

Image credit: Nikita Podobulkin Wind Farm in India

Within India's vast mega cities, apartment living is more common than standalone housing. Yet, residential apartments are currently a barrier to EV uptake the world over, and likely to be a key reason India is lagging behind the world in EV Sales. Many locals have been waiting on the government to publish promised building code guidelines for EV. Finally today, the wait is over for India. The Department of Town and Country Planning under the Ministry of Housing & Urban Development has issued guidelines to provide for electric vehicle charging infrastructure through addendum to Model Building Bye-Laws. 

India is known for flip-flopping on EV policy, particularly after the u-turn on their initial announcement for EV-sales-only after 2030. (Now 30% New Sales by 2030.) It is possible then, that these new guidelines will also be relaxed if found to be impractical.

Even Norway struggles with the apartment issue, While California has already issued guidelines for multi-dwelling complexes. The most common issues are: lack of space to install a power point near the parking spaces; meter room not located on same floor as parking; preventing electricity theft; apprehensive body corporates and building managers; billing for power on shared ev parking spaces; EVSE installation, ownership & maintenance; H&S concerns; and building's power capacity being fully utilised.

Sooner or later either the New Zealand government or local governments will need to address these issues for our apartment dwellers. Solutions apply to all of the issues, but the building industry and body corporates need to be educated on what those solutions are. Perhaps our nation's leaders need to formulate our own guidelines. India's new legislation will, therefore, be an interesting test case for NZ and other countries.

[Rachelle Tilsley - Better NZ Trust - 7 Jan 2019]

The opinions stated are the author's own and are not necessarily those of the Better NZ Trust,