Ireland selected to trial IT platform for electric cars

Ireland is to become the first country to trial a Europe-wide electric vehicle IT platform which will facilitate international roaming and seamless charging of electric cars across the continent.

The initiative was announced by the Minister for Communication, Energy and Natural Resources, Pat Rabbitte, at the Fully Charged 2012 conference in Dublin yesterday. The conference was attended by 200 international experts working in the electric vehicle sector and was held as a satellite event of the EuroScience Open Forum 2012.

Ireland was selected for the project because it has one of the most advanced charge point networks for electric vehicles (EVs) in Europe. The network established by the ESB subsidiary, ESB ecars, already covers 82% of main towns and cities with a total number of 772 charge points. A further 400-plus sites are at the design stage.

“The key objective of the project is to ensure that an electric vehicle driver will be able to travel throughout Europe and not have to worry about existing differences in business models and IT systems used in other countries,” said an ESB spokesperson.

He explained further: “Essentially we are testing an IT platform which will support international roaming. Payments will take place in your home country account — much like with mobile phones.”

In a keynote speech, the executive director of the International Energy Agency, Maria van der Hoeven, called for a reduction in the cost of batteries for EVs as well as improved infrastructure and policies to support the greater use of electric cars.

Mr Rabbitte told the conference that Ireland wanted to be at the vanguard of the development of electric vehicles and work was under way to ensure the country was an “early mover” in the sector.