Early into 2021, it already appears that electric vehicles (EV) are due for a big year.
Not only did the Biden Administration pledge to convert all of the government’s 650,000 vehicles into electric models, but General Motors last week said it will no longer sell combustion engine vehicles by 2035, switching to zero emission cars on all models by that time.
With a new influx of EVs being sold on the market, infrastructure to support these cars will be needed. Which is why EV chargers are set for massive growth as well and one of the reasons Wallbox, a Spain-based EV charger vendor, has introduced its first home charging unit for North America.
The Pulsar Plus is a new charger built specifically for the North American EV market that supports Wi-Fi but also Bluetooth if no connection is available, or connectivity is cut off.
Wallbox has installed about 40,000 EV chargers worldwide with the bulk residing in Europe. However, the company has sold its chargers to 43 different countries in Asia Pacific, China and Australia.
Douglas Alfaro, general manager of Wallbox North America, told Electronics360 that one of the reasons for bringing its chargers to North America is that the company wants to address a region where EV charging is becoming popular and North America is one of the highest EV penetration points in the world with growth in adoption accelerating.
“The timing is also good with new and better EVs being deployed,” Alfaro said. “There is a big transition happening and you see the opportunities to diversify EV models for different price points. This began with the leadership of Tesla but now auto makers are investing big in terms of branding and support.”
Additionally, Alfaro said forces of regulation are getting on board with California pledging to phase out gasoline powered cars and other states examining the ban of these vehicles as well. In Canada, the province of Quebec has announced a target to ban gasoline powered passenger cars by 2035.
While there are a handful of residential charging companies in North America, there are more than 20 residential charger vendors in Europe. Alfaro said now is the time to grab a foothold in the North American market as none of the vendors are capable of offline use, which the Pulsar Plus enables through Bluetooth.
The Pulsar Plus functions are managed locally, not in the cloud, allowing users to control charger scheduling and power sharing offline through a smartphone and proprietary app when an active Wi-Fi connection cannot be found. When connected to Wi-Fi, the Pulsar Plus can be controlled via voice assistants such as Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa.
While the Pulsar Plus is designed for residential charging of EVs, it could also be used in fleets or multi-families where there is a 1-to-1 charger to car ratio. Alfaro said that Wallbox is currently developing a product that will address public charging, but no details are available for this future device.
