The prominent electric vehicle charging solutions company eMotorWerks will be supplying 1,000 free smart, cloud-connected charging units to Sonoma Clean Power customers as part of a new program from the Californian utility company, according to an email sent to CleanTechnica and EV Obsession.
These free smart charging units — the JuiceBox Pro charger, or the JuicePlug EVSE adapter to convert existing residential charging units into smart charging units — will be used to help Sonoma Clean Power customers automatically take advantage of any lower energy pricing that may arise. Of course, they are free only while program funds last.
The utility benefits since the use of the smart charging units is a means of managing electric vehicle (EV) charging demands and maintaining grid stability. This is useful since an EV generally pulls as much energy when it’s being charged as a whole house does in a 24 hour time period.
In addition to the free smart charging units, program participants are eligible to “receive $250 for joining SCP’s smart-grid charging rewards program.”
“Today we have around 3,800 EVs in Sonoma County and anticipate 10,000 in the next 3 years,” stated Geof Syphers, CEO of Sonoma Clean Power (SCP). “Our partnership with eMotorWerks allows us to intelligently incorporate and communicate with these EVs on our grid. Given the continuing increase in local renewable energy resources, and the growth of EV charging, we see the opportunity to leverage the eMotorWerks technology to anticipate and modulate electrical demand to meet all of our customer’s needs as critical to reliability and scalability of our services.”
The email provides a bit more: “The eMotorWerks technology is focused on internet-enabled Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment (EVSE) products that are remotely connected to JuiceNet, a patented, cloud-based communication, control, and intelligence platform that dynamically matches users’ historical charging patterns, real-time input, and signals from grid operators and utilities to increase grid flexibility to meet EV charging demand, as well as maximize the use of renewable power.”
Notably, while Sonoma Clean Power will be providing the smart charging units itself freely as part of the new program, customers are still responsible for installation costs and for shipping and handling.
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