## Schneider Electric and EverCharge collaborate to accelerate EV charging in multi-tenant buildings

##### 21 January 2016

Schneider Electric and EverCharge, a provider of intelligent, scalable, and fully managed electric vehicle (EV) charging solutions, announced a global collaboration to accelerate the build-out of EV charging infrastructure in urban buildings with multiple occupants including apartments, condominiums and office buildings.

EV charging currently presents multi-tenant facilities and their occupants with a number of challenges when trying to add EV charging stations, especially when it comes to sharing power. Most buildings have a finite amount of electricity, and gaining access to additional resources can be costly, complex and unfeasible.

EverCharge will integrate Schneider Electric’s EVlink Home EV Charger with EverCharge’s SmartPower technology, which can rapidly charge multiple vehicles and increase building charging capacity up to ten times without requiring costly infrastructure upgrades.

When SmartPower senses extra power is available or that the rated capacity is reached, the system allocates power to vehicles according to their needs, maximizing building infrastructure usage while reducing deployment costs. In addition to the integration of each company’s technology, Schneider Electric will also work with EverCharge to expand its customer base to markets outside of the US.

I would be interested to see how this system could apply to our 144 internal garages Condo building.

Sharing (with minimum investment) the available power (10,000 KVA) between, 121 steady unit users, 3 cell phone supplier roof sites (about 3% of total), commun spaces (about 30% of total current consumption) and future electrified vehicles charging facilities is interesting.

Our winter time usage is relatively low because we have a high percentage of 'snow birds' away in southern USA and Mexico from November to March every year.

We rarely reach 50% of available power level due to milder winters and progressively more 'snow birds'.

1 kW = 1 kVA differing only by the power factor, which we will assume to be 1.0. The power factor is related to the phase difference between the voltage and the current; this is only a substantial factor for inductive or capacitive loads or AC motors, which a battery charging system is not.

If everyone uses a 6.6 kW charger at the same time then it's 121 x 6.6 = 798 kW which will be very close to 798 kVA. It's not even an issue. 8% of total capacity.

10 MVA (essentially 10 megawatts) sounds like an awful lot for a residential building of that size. It's almost 300 amps at 240 volts for each unit. That's a lot. (Sure your numbers are right ... or is someone making steel in an electric arc furnace on site??)

My house has a 100 amp 240 volt supply and normal usage is a tiny fraction of that. A planned future 6.6 kW charger will pull 28 amps.

@ BP

The large units (50%) with 3 washrooms each are quipped with 400 Amps distribution panels and the smaller units (50%) with 2 washrooms each are equipped with 200 Amps panels. The average is 300 Amps per unit. Heating, cooking, hotwater, air cond etc is 100% electric in all 121 units.

The commun areas: swimming pools, saunas, 4 elevators, 4 stairways, offices, salons, workshops, garages, hallways, main entrance etc are all 100% electric heated/air cond and constitute about 30% of the total max. load. The 10,000 KVA main transformer was based on maximum coldest winter days (-35C) when the structure was built with 100% of the co-owners present.

Since co-owners are older and 50% are now regular 'snow birds' , the peak consumption winter days are down and the 10,000 KVA is not currently fully used.

We have enough capacity to slow charge 100+ BEVs but the electrical distribution and metering (for the internal garages) will have to be redone. The local electrical code does not allow two distribution panels from the same meter. The lowest cost solution would be to add about 12-400Amps meters and distribution panels in the electrical room and run/distribute power (under metal conduits) to every (metered) parking garages charger. Cost per charging facility/garage space is between CAN $5,000 and CAN$5,800.

Getting the majority (with large ICEVs) to agree is almost (currently) impossible.

The alternative solution would be with FCEVs and/or 500 miles BEVs and to refill/charge in outside public facilities.

@ HD
your description of the building and its occupants, especailly the second to last sentence, strikes me as a synopsis of so much that seems wrong with the conversation about energy use and our future. As part of my job I teach a college level course that includes some assessment of our current and future global energy consumption. So I find myself trying to explain to 20 somethings that we have to find a way to do a better job of using the resources we have, etc, all the while knowing that my generation the 60s generation, has done, and stubbornly continues to do, a dreadful job of just that. How can we teach our children to create a better world when "we" that is, the people with the resources and the folks in charge, largely refuse to make significant changes or offer solutions?

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