World EV Day highlights need for reliable charging infrastructure

The day highlights the continued need for EV adoption, however, with this comes the need for reliable, secure, EV charge points, which have not been able to keep up with car sales throughout the past year.

Justin Godfrey-Cass, Head of Transport Solutions at Wireless Logic, comments on the challenges of charge point rollouts, and the need for reliable, secure connectivity:

“World EV day reflects the continued commitment to EV adoption from businesses, the government, and individuals. However, increasing numbers of electric vehicles on the road means the demand for reliable charge points will also increase. With these rollouts, charge point operators and the government must ensure they are not sacrificing quality for quantity, as this will only damage consumer confidence and stunt EV public-adoption. All charge points will require resilient and highly secure two-way connectivity.

“As the EV rollout continues to grow and take shape, it will ultimately represent a critical national infrastructure (CNI) relied upon by the public and everyday businesses. Therefore, secure connectivity cannot be overlooked. Establishing a ‘secure-by-design’ policy measure will be vital. Operators will need to secure these assets and public data 24/7. It isn’t enough to simply install thousands of charge points, consumers expect their data to be kept confidential through secure private networking, and operators must make it a top priority to defend infrastructure from cyber-attacks, and counter any anomalies to ensure reliable connectivity at all times.

“Massive EV adoption also presents a significant load-balancing challenge for energy service providers. As charge points are rolled out it becomes harder and harder to track whether devices are a load or a source of power on the network. Managing fluctuations and preventing power surges will only get more difficult increasing the risk of possible power outages. Service providers need to be able to monitor operational performance and control remote assets to schedule charging cycles or determine when EVs are charging or discharging to help address the imbalance in the grid."