The problem with most electric vehicle charging stations is that you never know where your electricity is coming from–and unfortunately it’s often arriving courtesy of a dirty coal plant. Luckily, the prefab SunPods SP-300 EV Plug-N-Go solar charging station, installed this week in San Jose, CA, changes that by reassuring EV drivers that their power is coming straight from the sun.
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Perhaps the best feature of the SunPods charger is its modular capability. The charger is a plug-n-play device, with no assembly required on-site. So theoretically, a SunPods charger could travel from place to place depending on where it is needed, making it easy to set up and no hassle to relocate.
The SunPods charger in San Jose is connected to the grid, offsetting energy use from EV drivers. But if the SP-300 is outfitted with battery storage, it can act as a completely self-sufficient device. And if the SunPods charger is connected to a smart grid, utilities can grab power from it when necessary.
No word on how much the charger costs or when SunPods will begin installing its charging stations elsewhere, but chances are that if the San Jose test goes well, you might see one pop up near you.
Via Autobloggreen
+ SunPods
Love hearing about these new infrastructure developments. They just need to make these things cheaper, more efficient, and solve the intermittency issues. Solar power is going to be a total dark horse.