Same chargers, slower battery ageing and a smaller grid connection

Chargers, together with the vehicle, are where the battery data comes from and where BMB’s intelligence lands. That covers AC chargers and DC fast chargers in the depot, pantographs for buses and high power chargers along the motorway. Every session measures the battery being charged. Every decision about charging speed decides how fast that battery ages.

The job is to reduce the strain on the batteries and predict faults. At the same time, the charger has to be used enough to pay for itself, and the site’s peak has to stay below the grid connection.

Why the cost of a charging site sits in the peak, not in the energy

A 150 kW fast charger costs €132,000 to €182,000 installed. Getting the grid connection approved takes around 18 months. The grid operator bills the highest peak of the month, whether that peak lasted two hours or twenty. The peak is 40 to 50% of the running cost of a charging site.

Chargers report being online 96 to 99% of the time, but across Europe only 86% of charging sessions actually succeed. In a depot, a failed session is a vehicle that does not leave in the morning.

BMB works out a charging profile for every session and hands it to the charger or the charging software. It trims the harshest peak in the current, so the pack ages more slowly while the charge stays at a similar speed. Heavy commercial packs that mostly fast charge lose around 5% a year, and nobody at the depot sees that cost on any bill.

Across the site, BMB works out how to spread the power drawn from the grid. The peak stays low, and the site runs on the connection it already has. The charging software carries out the plan.