Industrial Automation Magazine India

EV charging needs to be understood differently

Published on : Thursday 07-11-2019

Maxson Lewis, Managing Director, Magenta Power, responded to a few questions from Industrial Automation on EV charging.

 Charging stations is the weak link in the still-emerging EV scenario. Is this a viable proposition?

While many think Charging Infrastructure is the bottleneck towards electric vehicle (EV) adoption, I have a slightly contrarian view. I am not suggesting what I say is the absolute truth, but a fair share of our experience in building the ecosystem. India has very limited options for purchasing electric vehicles, especially four-wheelers; I mean options in terms of good quality at an optimal price point. The more options (vehicles) are on the road, the charging infrastructure would build around it. If the number of vehicles on the road increases, then we can also go out with deploying charging infrastructure.

Also, I think there is a huge brouhaha around DC fast charging. Globally up to 80% of the EV charging happens at homes and offices – places where people park their cars normally and naturally. EV charging needs to be understood differently and comparing that DC fast charging is equivalent to filling your tanks with Petrol/Diesel is a wrong view.

What is the model Magenta Power proposes for this, given the high initial costs?

Having said that Magenta Power is making EV charging Available, Accessible, Affordable and Automated under our network and brand called as ChargeGrid, we are trying to solve the charging challenges by providing Indian solutions to Indian challenges in EV charging.

We provide the following end-to-end solutions and services:

1. Hardware (we have chargers made in India, made for India for specific use cases – be it community charging or for individual charging. Be it malls, housing complex all who are looking for charging solutions can talk to us

2. Our charging platform is made for 2W, 3W or 4W irrespective of the type and make of vehicle

3. Software – Our ChargeGrid platform is an open platform, so if you have a charger and want to provide that service to others and earn, our platform allows that. Sign up and host your charger on our network, and

4. Service: Our ChargeGrid network growing slowly and steadily will provide charging services to user.

What will be the charging type followed – Rapid, Regular or Slow, or combination of all?

DC charging which in India is considered rapid charging is required for a specific use cases (fleets and highways), but the mass adoption of EV will be driven by availability of safe and simple AC charging.

 What we are putting on the ground is a good mix of both. We do a detailed survey and analysis on the potential and basic feasibility. It is ridiculous to see chargers put up in areas where parking of a vehicle becomes a traffic issue. So deciding the what, which and where in EV charging involves all those decision parameters and is not just a lift, shift and install model

Magenta Powers has tied up with other tech companies to execute this. What are these companies bringing to the table?

We have been fortunate to find the right partners working along with us in this journey. HPCL supported us from the very beginning and we owe a lot of that relationship to Mr Sanjay Kumar who identified us as potential partners. HPCL bring to bear the ability to scale and engage at a very different level.

We have a partnership with Siemens Ltd, with whom we are developing unique solutions on the software and grid side. Siemens has inherent strengths in the electricity business and working with us in the Electric Vehicle space is a logical extension.

We also have certain OEMs like Mahindra Electric, who have supported us beyond official partnerships. In true spirit of building the EV ecosystem, they did pull us into the plunge. We also have other OEMs who have been supportive and have engaged us on multiple pilot programs.

We have Nexus Malls who supported us with real estate to put up charging infrastructure and bore with us through the pains of setting up this new technology in Chandigarh.

The EV growth is an ecosystem growth and will require multiple entities to work together. At ChargeGrid, we have found this interesting collaboration approach working very well for us and the industry at large.

How do you plan to scale up, now that the beginning is made?

Scale is a matter of time. We have set ourselves some ambitious plans and we are ahead of schedule in many and lagging behind on a few. At this point our scale is going to come on the back of AC charging and ensuring basis availability of charging points (not stations). 

We believe 2020 is when the flip towards EV will become unstoppable. Till then we will continue to chip away and build new and innovative solutions which the Indian EV ecosystem needs.

How can the potential of rooftop segment of solar power be exploited of its potential?

We were a clean energy solutions company and affordable solutions is part of our innovation mandate. To that end we have bridged the gap between clean energy and EV charging by installing solar based EV charging solutions. A few weeks ago we installed India’s first housing society which has installed solar based EV charging.

Our firm belief is that combining EV charging with rooftop solar is the most logical thing to do and is a positive sum game. This not only reduces your overall electricity bill, but also qualifies a true clean mobility drive.

This concept suddenly makes the adoption of rooftop solar amenable. Instead of going to a fuel station, you can use your rooftop to make your own clean fuel for your vehicles. For those in high rises who did not consider solar earlier and are possibly worried now about high cost of electricity for EV charging – this becomes a slam dunk solution.