Kia announces the arrival of Plug & Charge technology on its electric cars, starting with the new EV9. The latter should make the charging experience more intuitive for customers, while many manufacturers already offer it.
If recharging your electric car was the subject of many fears a few years ago, things have now changed. Already, because the number of terminals has increased considerably over time, while France today has more than 100,000. But that’s not all.
A simplified experience
Indeed, in addition to availability, the charging experience is also more pleasant than before as companies develop solutions to facilitate operations. For example by equipping their terminals with bank card payment terminals. Which will soon be mandatory everywhere in Europe. But there is an even more practical alternative.
We think in particular of Plug & Charge, which is starting to develop well. This increasingly widespread technology makes it possible to start charging a car without the driver need to identify themselves by passing a badge on the terminal. Which may seem trivial, but it saves a lot of time, while avoiding having to take out your card when it rains, for example.
The vehicle is identified by the terminal and charging starts automatically as soon as the socket is plugged in. A practical system now adopted by more and more manufacturers, including Kia which recently lifted the veil on its new EV9. The large electric SUV, which will compete with the Tesla Model X and other Volvo EX90s, will play the role of flagship for the manufacturer.
It is equipped with numerous technologies such as level 2 autonomous driving and a route planner, but will soon enhance its Plug & Charge capabilities. A new feature announced by Kia in a press release just published and which will later be deployed on all other electrified models in the range. This will undoubtedly be the case for the EV6 and the new EV5.
More practical
This technology will be compatible with Ionity terminals, which have already been equipped with it for several months and with which Kia works. For the record, the manufacturer is part of the joint venture that created the network of fast charging stations, with Volkswagen as well as Mercedes and Ford. The Korean brand will also offer this function on BP terminals. But rest assured, this service is completely secure.
It is based on an automated digital certificate exchange process. between the vehicle and the charging station » as the brand explains. This allows the car to be identified and make the link with the recharge contract associated with the customer’s account. If the press release does not specify it, it is likely that Kia is using the Open Plug&Charge Protocol (OPCP) created by several companies including BMW, Daimler and Bosch.
The latter offers free access to this technology for brands that would like to integrate it into their cars. For the moment, there are already many of them, including BMW of course, but also Tesla, which has been offering this function for several years, but only with its own terminals. This has also been the case more recently for Skoda as well as Cupra and Volkswagen.
Several charging station operators are also compatible with this technology. We think of Ionity, of course, but also of Fastned which recently offered its Autocharge.