Three clean energy technology companies, Octopus Energy, Uber and BYD, have partnered to offer “the UK’s cheapest” electric vehicle (EV) charging bundle for Uber drivers.
Pitched to accelerate the switch to EVs, the partnership will see Octopus install up to 1,000 free home chargers for Uber drivers who order a BYD car and sign up to Octopus’ EV specialist tariff, Intelligent Octopus Go. Octopus will also offer participating drivers an 8% discount on its charging service, Octopus Electroverse.
BYD is an automotive manufacturer that claims to be the world’s largest producer of EVs. It has also moved into the battery storage space, providing battery energy storage systems (BESS) for large scale projects.
Greg Jackson, Octopus Energy founder, said that, thanks to the partnership, “the unstoppable transport revolution is well and truly underway”.
Elsewhere in the business, Octopus Energy’s utility digitalisation platform Kraken has partnered with EV charging brand Hypervolt to integrate its hardware onto the platform. Kraken, powered by AI, monitors the electricity grid in real-time, enabling automated smart charging.
Additionally, its SmartFlex product allows energy companies to optimise customer energy usage to flatten peak demand and cut costs, benefitting the UK’s power grid as a whole.
Hypervolt is an official partner of Enphase Energy and will provide a “seamless experience” for customers using both Hypervolt and Enphase’s solar and home battery offerings.
Hypervolt CEO Flavian Alexandru said: “This partnership is a significant step forward in our mission to make EV ownership not only accessible but more sustainable. By leveraging Kraken’s advanced technology, we are enabling Hypervolt users to seamlessly charge their vehicles with cleaner, cheaper energy.”
In April this year, Octopus and California-based Enphase partnered to deploy Enphase IQ8 Microinverters and IQ Battery 5P in the UK, making its microinverter-based solar and battery technology available to Octopus customers.
Octopus EV expansion
Octopus’ various ‘tentacles’ combine to manage EV batteries through the Intelligent Octopus Go tariff. In May, it hit a cumulative 1GW of batteries, which are combined into virtual power plants (VPPs) through Kraken.
Octopus Energy for Business also announced that it will provide green electricity to power 100% of UK chargepoint operator (CPO) InstaVolt’s charging network. As part of the deal, InstaVolt chargers will be included in Octopus Electroverse’s Plunge Pricing scheme, which was announced earlier this year, and is another Octopus initiative targeting flexibility.
Plunge supports grid balancing by allowing Octopus Electroverse customers to receive discounts of between 15% and 45% per kWh for charging their cars at pre-designated times when there is an excess of cheap renewable power in the UK electricity grid.
In late August, the company announced that Octopus Electroverse had officially become Europe’s largest EV charging platform, with almost 850,000 connected chargers available across the continent through the Electroverse app.