EVC Gentari Improves BESS Charging Stations Ahead Of Deepavali Holidays

With the long Deepavali holiday coming up next week, EV Connection (EVC) – JomCharge and Gentari – have announced several innovative tech upgrades to their battery energy storage system (BESS) powered EV charging stations, aimed at significantly enhancing the charging experience.

BESS technology solves this by storing electricity from a trickle charge, which can then be released to charge EVs, enabling stations to operate in areas previously unsuitable for fast charging.

In Malaysia, many locations are ideal and ripe to house EV chargers but lack the electricity supply as we at Carz.com.my has highlighted many times. This is common at highway R&Rs and laybys where the energy grid supply is only sufficient for small-scale amenities like restaurants and petrol stations.

However, according to EVC, the challenge lies in battery capacity, the Behrang Southbound Layby for example has a 300-kWh battery – enough to charge six EVs with 50-kWh batteries back-to-back before it needs to recharge. This used to be sufficient until surged in EV sales by 150% in 1H 2024. This insufficiency is best witnessed during festive seasons and long weekends.

To address these challenges, EVC and Gentari have developed several key upgrades:

• First: the JomCharge app now includes a battery level indicator, helping users better plan their journeys.
• Second: EVs at these stations will have a capped maximum State of Charge (SoC) at 80%, allowing more vehicles to charge before the battery runs out.
• Third: System now manages energy distribution when battery levels are low. When the battery depletes, the station will automatically stop recharging the battery and instead direct any remaining battery power, grid electricity, and solar energy into one charger, allowing EVs to continue charging at up to 50kW. Once the vehicle leaves, the battery will resume recharging.

These features entered beta testing phase on Oct 23, 2024, at the PLUS Behrang Southbound and Northbound laybys with plans to expand to other BESS stations thereafter.