According to the International Council for Clean Transport (ICCT), road traffic accounts for about 20 per cent of global pollution. Air pollution has become a universal problem, and a growing number of countries are working intensively to reduce it and completely neutralize it. In aiming to reduce the exhaust gasses coming from traffic, the states pass the laws to limit the purchase of cars with ICE (internal combustion engines).
Thus, the United Kingdom, Germany, Ireland, and the Netherlands have devised the strategy to ban the sale of new cars with internal combustion engines by 2030. Norway has a very ambitious plan – to accomplish a full transition to cleaner forms of transportation by 2025, while most is expected from China, which, according to some forecasts, will make a sudden transition to full electrification of traffic by 2035. Subsidies and many other benefits encourage the purchase of electric and hybrid vehicles.
Many governments around the world are trying to improve air quality and protect the environment in this way. Serbia is slowly beginning to follow world trends. For subsidizing electric and hybrid vehicles’ purchase, our Government has set aside 120 million dinars for 2020, and electric vehicles can more often be seen on our streets. It is necessary to provide enough chargers for the drivers of these cars to function smoothly in traffic, without having to worry that they will drive all the way down to an empty battery.
In focus:
The leading men of MT-KOMEX realized that they could offer networked EV chargers as the best service for the drivers to find an ideal place to recharge their cars fast and easy. Charge&GO platform is everything an electric car owner needs. It is the first regional digital platform and application that remunerates the use of the charging spot for electric vehicles, which arose in partnership with the global Virta system form Finland.
The charge&GO system is designed to give e-powered car drivers the ability to find a charging point fast and easy, authorize themselves, plug in a vehicle when needed, stop charging and continue their journey. Registered and unregistered users can use this platform, and in addition
to chargers in Serbia, they have more than 100,000 chargers in 28 countries at their disposal. This system provides the possibility for foreigners to see the chargers in Serbia. At the same time, users registered in our country, through the partner network can find the chargers that are in the system, which includes internal and external roaming network of charging stations.
“The platform charge&GO has networked electric car drivers and owners of EV chargers, and we are the operators of the network. By using the platform, we can manage the energy power and consumption on the station systems themselves, and the remote check-up of each charger is also one of the possibilities of our system”, explains Miloš Kostić form MT-KOMEX.
Platform users can charge their electric vehicles fast and easy while having full control over the entire charging process, whether being a registered or unregistered user. The whole charging system is quite simple – the first step is to find a charging point through the platform or
mobile application. At mapa.chargego.rs you immediately get information which station is free to use. At the charging point, it is necessary to authorize by using an RFID card or mobile phone, either by scanning the QR code or entering the charger’s ID number. The charging session starts the moment you connect the cable to the selected charging point. You can follow the charging either on the platform or the application, and when you want to end the process, it is necessary to finish the process the same way you started it.
The last step is to unplug the cable and to continue your journey. If you use the system without registration, you need to start charging by scanning the QR code or typing the page ID number on the platform’s webpage punjenje.chargo.rs. When you do that, you will get the accurate display of a price per minute and the terms of use. You can change the language, and then it opens the page for entering the information of credit card. In the end, you choose the type of connection. You get the information on the amount of energy used and the duration of the session. Upon finished charging session you receive an email with an electronic invoice.
“The owners of electric vehicles who choose the option to register on the charge&GO system get a number of benefits, such as the better price for charging, both in the country and in the partner network, and can also choose between prepaid and post-paid options. It is usual for individuals to use the prepaid option, while corporate users have the opportunity to pay for our services on a monthly and quarterly basis”, adds Kostić.
The registration process on the charge&GO system is very easy and can be done by simply registering on the portal or installing a mobile application. You receive a welcome email in which you get the link to verify your account, and once you confirm it, you can access the following steps. The application or platform will guide you, and once you enter all the required data, your journey into the electric future can begin!
With the charge&GO app on your smartphone, you can find the nearest place to charge your electric car with either slow or fast chargers. You can manage the user account you have created and preview the history of all charging sessions. You can check the charger’s status at any time on the charger map, and the app makes all the following steps easier – to start charging, track the charging time on your phone and stop the session when needed. The platform users can use a roaming network with more than 100,000 chargers. It is important to know that all users of the Virta platform have the right to use intern roaming without additional fees. When it comes to external roaming stations Hubjet and
Gireve, charging vehicles can be done smoothly, but at an additional cost.
The partner of the charge&GO system is the company ABB. In front of their headquarters in Belgrade, a 50kW charger is installed, and it is integrated into the charge&GO system. The network also includes charging points at Gazprom gas stations in Stari Banovci, Velika Plana and Novi Sad, and in front of the company Termovent in Kladovo. There are also 5 chargers in Plaza Kragujevac shopping centre at your disposal. The same number of EV chargers are available at Promenada Novi Sad Shopping centre. Very soon, 6 new chargers in LEDI hub in Stari Banovci will be integrated into the charge&GO system.
“Our customers can be completely confident in our services because they have technical assistance, customer service with hotline and mobile teams for urgent technical support at their disposal 24/7. Besides, there is a Support/Frequently Asked Questions page on the charge&GO website where you can find a large amount of useful information, as well as the complete documentation with instructions”, adds Kostić.
Prepared by: Milica Radičević
You can read the article in the new issue of the Energy portal Magazine SMART CITIES, december 2020 – february 2021.
