Electrify America and Electrify Canada are developing EV charging stations that will allow electric vehicle drivers to charge their vehicles and facilitate payment simply by plugging them in. Conforming to a global standard known as ISO 15118, they eliminate the need for the smartphone apps and RFID cards currently required to start a vehicle charging session.
Electrify, the charging network established by Volkswagen as part of its post-diesel emissions scandal penance, calls Plug&Charge "the first step to enable EV smart charging and vehicle-to-grid (V2G) communications.
Electrify says its network will be the first to implement ISO 15118 at charging stations in North America with the help of Hubject, a Berlin-based joint venture of BMW, Daimler and Volkswagen that Electrify says boasts "a track record of leading in eMobility tech initiatives."
Electrify doesn't offer a timeline for when its North American Plug&Charge enabled charging stations will be online, but that the schedule depends on automakers too. Only EVs designed with ISO 15118 compatibility will be able to take advantage of this one-step charging process.
In April 2018, Mercedes-Benz boasted that its Smart EQ Fortwo and Forfour models were the first production EVs designed to support ISO 15118. Benz says those cars are part of Hubject's pilot project, and as far as we can tell, they currently remain the only ISO 15118-compliant cars in the marketplace.
Coincidentally, last April saw the world's first one-step charger open for business in the Dutch city of Arnhem. It's operated by ElaadNL, a consortium of Dutch electricity grid operators that focuses on smart charging initiatives.
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