Are you making the most of your private electric vehicle charging stations? As Spirii CEO Tore Harritshøj explains, there’s a raft of revenue-building strategies out there to help ease upfront costs – and even turn a reliable profit.
Private electric vehicle fleets are proliferating across Europe. From buses and trucks to company cars and taxi ranks, the EV transition is gathering momentum in the fleet space, even in the face of relatively steep upfront setup costs.
But those costs can be mitigated; businesses all over the continent are discovering the innate benefits that come from owning charging infrastructure in a world hungry for as many charge points as possible.
Here are two key strategies for unlocking the earning power of your private charging stations.
If you build it, they will come
Private fleets with their own in-house charging solutions – such as those for public transport or delivery vehicles, for instance – are often uneasy about sharing those chargers with members of the public, but doing so is a sure-fire way to garner ongoing, reliable revenue.
Right now, there is a Europe-wide deficit of chargers per demand, and as more and more drivers switch to EVs, that demand is only going to grow. This is where businesses with their own charging solutions can step in – for mutual benefit.
Any business that can find a way to securely open up its chargers to the public is almost guaranteed to find an audience for them. With the right software platform to manage things, chargers can be set to be publicly available at specific times, with tailored tariffs, and in a way that’s fully transparent to nearby drivers.
A taxi company in a European capital offers a real-world example of how powerful this can be; its charger utilisation more than doubled after it opened things up to the public, resulting in an additional revenue stream so robust that EV charging has become a secondary commercial interest, instead of a cost.
Giving back to the grid
While opening chargers up for public use is an obvious option, there are less well-known ways to turn infrastructure into ongoing revenue – and aid local energy supplies in the process.
Demand response is the term given to software-based solutions that can turn charging stations into an intelligent, proactive part of the energy grid.
The way this works is that charge point operators can downscale, delay or temporarily deactivate their stations in response to peaks in grid demand, in exchange for compensation from utility companies.
This is a win-win; utility providers get help with managing energy needs, while charge point operators receive financial compensation for their efforts.
Moreover, demand response challenges the status quo that charging hardware has a one-way relationship with the energy supply. With the right software platform, charging infrastructure can explicitly aid its own evolution by allowing growth in a way that doesn’t impact overall supply and demand.
Mutually beneficial gains
When green energy meets intelligent software, everybody wins. The continuing transition toward electric transport provides opportunities not only for the environment but also for savvy business owners who can set their forward-thinking technology to work for them.
Freeing up underused private chargers for public use – and ensuring that that usage works in tandem with energy providers’ needs – is a mutually beneficial way to accelerate eco-friendly initiatives.
Solutions such as these mean EV drivers get more choices around charging locations, energy consumption can be smartly managed, and charge point owners can generate new revenue streams separate from their primary business.
