Ian Johnson, CEO of Osprey Charging
Surge in fleet company car ownership of electric vehicles (EVs)
2021 has shown that we can expect to see demand for EVs far out-stretch supply. The significant tax and CSR benefits mean that a large majority of this will be in the company car fleet market, where some leasing companies have reported 90% of orders being for BEVs. This places a huge responsibility and market opportunity on the shoulders of the eMSPs who will look to establish themselves as the ‘fuel cards’ of the future.
The implications for charging networks are that those who are most skilled at delivering roaming solution integrations will be best-placed to win the battle for the company car driver’s business.
Bigger, better, faster charging infrastructure – with new innovation
The huge increase in EV adoption has seen queues starting to form at more traditional EV infrastructure assets. The race is therefore now on to deliver sites with a much greater number of chargers, with higher-power charging speeds, whilst an increasingly complex and competitive land grab for grid is played out. Innovation in infrastructure will be key, and 2022 will see hardware manufacturers and charging networks launching new technologies in load balancing, dynamic charging and battery back-ups to try to edge ahead of the competition.
A new norm – meeting the demands of the Great British public
Players in the EV infrastructure market have had it easy so far. The customer base has comprised early adopters with a high level of technical appreciation and environmental principal, which results in greater patience and support for the early-stage infrastructure. 2022 will see the number of ‘mass market’ EV drivers overtake those early adopters, and will bring an understandable expectation that charging is simple and works every time. This will sound the death knell for those who don’t put the customer experience at the heart of everything they do, as new EV drivers vote with their feet with those providers they can trust.
Doron Frenkel, Driivz founder and CEO
Site power limitations
With the accelerated electrification of vehicles and 80% of charging taking place at homes, workplaces, depots, and multi-dwelling units (MDUs) it will be critical to ensure that there is enough power at the edge of the grid to meet driver needs.
We will see more EV charging providers integrating local battery storage, along with local renewable energy sources, to workplace, fleet depot, and multi-station charging facilities, to balance or supplant grid capacity.
Optimised energy management powered by algorithms will be key to fully realise the benefits of green energy.
Energy demand response
We will see more industry players involved in experimenting and trialing demand response initiatives to help balance the demand coming from the growing number of electric vehicles.
Demand response will help us realize the potential of EVs as ‘batteries on wheels’, supported by Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) technologies.
The growing number of EVs will create a positive business case for demand response and additional business value for industry players.
eMobility market player’s consolidation
I believe we will witness more cases of consolidation of market players (e.g., M&As, partnerships). These newly formed heavy power consumers will potentially become ‘Prosumer’ entities, as they will be able to aggregate energy and using a centralised energy management solution, play a significant role in the flexibility market. We will start to see larger players share their charging plan with a power utility company and commit to the flexibility market.
