Ford LCV Data Harvesting Finds Best Rapid EV Charger Locations
Ford has trialed big data vehicle data harvesting to work out where EV rapid chargers are best installed in London.
Data streamed from its connected vehicles has enabled its scientists to develop an algorithm, based on more than one million kilometers of driving information and including where vehicles stopped, to pinpoint places where EV drivers can integrate charging within their normal operating patterns. Its research suggests it would be possible to significantly improve access to on-the-go charging while installing a relatively small number of strategically positioned rapid-charging stations.
Ford fitted 160 connected vans with a plug-in device to record journey data generating than 500 million data points from more than 15,000 days of vehicle use over an eight-month trial period. Using this data Ford’s global data insight and analytics team identified where charging points would be most useful to a fleet. While the vehicles in the trial were not electric, their commercial operation allows a reasonable forecast of where EV vans would best be able to charge.
John Scott, project lead, city data solutions at Ford Mobility, said: “Being able to harness, analyze and leverage the huge amounts of data that is available through existing vehicle use can make a real difference to how easy we find it to get about in the cities of the future. We also want to try to use data to help improve investment efficiency into the necessary infrastructure to support that approach.”
— Paul Myles is a seasoned automotive journalist based in London. Follow him on Twitter @Paulmyles_
