Reserve & Charge: Optimal integration of parking availability and EV charging

The ambitions target set by government to end the sale of fossil fuel vehicles by 2030 puts significant pressure on UK's charge point infrastructure to be ready and easily accessible for current and future EV owners.

The current reality however is very different. There are not enough public charge points available to boost EV user confidence in EV uptake and those available often offer poor user experience, increasing user anxiety and causing frustration of EV users. At the same time, low utilisation of public charge point infrastructure remains a major issue for a charge point provider profitability, making a business case for rapid EV charge point rollout difficult.

A key area to break this chicken and egg situation is to drastically improve EV user experience at public charge points and boost the confidence of EV users (current & future) in the UK. EV users want to be able to secure a charging bay whenever they require and plan their daily journey without any hassle. Operators of charge points want to maximise utilisation of these to increase profits and to ensure that their infrastructure can satisfy existing demand.

Reserve&Charge leverages recent innovation in smart parking technologies and brings these to EV charging infrastructures, integrating real-time data and novel service capabilities. Specific innovations focus on reliable occupancy detection at charge points, pre-booking of charging bays across multiple CPOs, automation of enforcement for operators, overstay notifications for users and automatic payments.

The resulting system benefits both EV users and parking infrastructure owners/operators: EV users have greater certainty to acquire a public charging point and peace of mind when planning their journey. It also improves the payment process by giving EV users advanced warning to avoid overpayment due to overstay and an automated payment process. Benefits for the charge point owner are improved enforcement by automatic detection of violations and optimised charge point utilisation.

The proposed solution is applicable to a wider range of public charging scenarios. Our initial market focus is on commuters, including disabled drivers, at train station park & ride (P&R) car parks and transportation service providers. This is in line with the UK Road to Zero strategy (2018) stating: "In particular, train station car parks hold an opportunity for more destination charge points". TfWM Park+Ride car parks are ideal for the planned Reserve&Charge demonstrations and user acceptance tests. The identified market opportunity offers significant growth potential over the next decade.