CitrineOS Opens EV Charging Software for the Community
The path is clear: Electric vehicles are the future. Sleek new models at various price points, federal funding and tax incentives are driving momentum. But the fact remains that less than 15% of the world’s new car sales are electric. Why is adoption so slow?
For most drivers, the daily reality of owning an EV remains inconvenient. Charging stations in most urban and rural areas are scarce, unpredictable and unevenly distributed. And unlike the pervasive network of gas stations, the infrastructure that supports EVs feels less certain, leaving drivers wondering if an EV can get them where they need to go.
We were called to accelerate this adoption by increasing confidence in EVs. To do it, we’re solving the biggest barrier to entry: making charging accessible and reliable. And we’re doing it with open source.
OCPP 2.0.1 and NEVI are paving the way for EV CPOs
Charging fear is slowing EV sales — 75 percent of Americans confirmed it — and the auto industry is working on solving the problem. Massive federal funding in the U.S. via National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) and standards like Open Charge Point Interface (OCPI) and Open Charge Point Protocol (OCPP) are helpful. But there remain bottlenecks to hitting the EV network goals. A tangle of proprietary software, hardware and vehicle manufacturers continues to plague charge point operators (CPOs), who desperately want to create more — and more reliable — charging for their customers.
For CPOs, building and maintaining enough EV charging stations to change how (and what) people drive requires reliable and remarkably good charge management software. The only way to make this available and accessible at scale is to make it open.
Introducing CitrineOS: the only open source EV charge management software based on OCPP 2.0.1
That’s why we launched CitrineOS. It delivers the critical back-end software required to quickly stand up EV charge management. We based it on real-world EV charging use cases (we’ve done this a time or two) and the need to improve reliability and consistency across the industry. The modular software enables widespread interoperability between charging equipment, vehicles and networks, which will enable drivers to charge at more stations.
Unlike proprietary EV charge management software, CitrineOS gives everyone — from enthusiasts to the largest EV CPOs — a common platform to accelerate charge management deployments and future-proof EV charging software.
With CitrineOS you can:
- Provision new charging equipment
- Complete charging transactions
- Remotely control charging equipment
- Monitor charger equipment uptime, power levels and degradation
- Manage energy consumption and throughput
Join us and collaborate on the open road
By open sourcing software that meets modern standards for OCPP 2.0.1 to support NEVI compliance, S44 has reduced the barrier of entry for secure and reliable charge management. With access to CitrineOS, homeowners, landlords, schools, fleet operators, service facilities and others can easily operate their charging equipment. Open source technology dramatically reduces the time to stand up EV charging from months to weeks and gives everyone a single reference standard to build to, which will increase reliability and performance worldwide.
To learn more about CitrineOS and get involved in the project, join us on GitHub or talk to us on Discord.
We’ll see you out there.