CHAdeMO is an association that is open to every organisation that works for the realisation of electric mobility. The Association, established in 2010, has over 420 members worldwide. In Europe, CHAdeMO European office based in Paris, France, actively reaches out to and works with the 130 European members.

Going beyond the borders of industrial segments, CHAdeMO provides a platform for a variety of stakeholders including charger manufacturers, automakers, utility companies, charge point operators, municipalities, certification bodies and NPOs.

CHAdeMO is a proprietary term for the fast charging infrastructure that the Association promotes.

The membership fees are used to maintain CHAdeMO’s activities to contribute to the development of global electric mobility. Some examples of such activities include organizing workshops and meetings to exchange technical information as well as best practices among members, developing and improving certification tests, and developing communication tools and materials, such as our website, brochures, etc.

Regular members have access to the CHAdeMO protocol that is necessary to develop CHAdeMO compatible electric vehicles and fast chargers. While CHAdeMO standard is published by IEC (International Electrotechnical Commission), CENELEC (EN 61851-23, 61851-24, 62196-3), IEEE (2030.1.1), JIS (Japanese Industrial Standard), etc, the right to have products certified is limited to our Regular members. Additionally, Regular members have an advantage to receive advice from the CHAdeMO technical team during the development of their CHAdeMO products.

To ensure compatibility between EVs and chargers and to maintain their quality, Regular members share technical information and participate in improving their functions. If you wish to develop or commercialise CHAdeMO chargers and need detailed technical information including CAN communication, we strongly suggest you to become our Regular member.

• If you wish to build chargers / EVs compatible with CHAdeMO → Regular Membership
• If you would like to offer services related to fast charging → Supporting Membership
• If you are a public administrative body, NPO or other public institution and would like to participate in the CHAdeMO activities → Special Membership

CHAdeMO is published as an IEC/EN standard: IEC 61851-23 and 61851-24 (covering communication between the charger and the EV). If you want to get the overview of the protocol, you can buy it from the IEC website.

You can also find the equivalent in your country from the CENELEC national committees (NC) websites if your country is a member (http://www.cenelec.eu/dyn/www/f?p=WEB:5:1377526778491001) by simply replacing IEC with EN for the reference (EN 61851-23 and EN 61851-24).

Alternatively, you can purchase it from the IEEE website (https://standards.ieee.org/findstds/standard/2030.1.1-2015.html) as IEEE2030.1.1 TM2015.

However, if you wish to develop or commercialise CHAdeMO chargers, you shall need more detailed technical information (interoperability, error handling, extended functions, etc.). For this, you need to become a CHAdeMO Regular Member and access CHAdeMO specification documents.

To become a Regular member, you need to fill out the registration form that you will find here.

CHAdeMO Association publishes standard specifications to define the fast charging interface between an electric vehicle and a CHAdeMO charger. Our charger certification system is a voluntary effort that we have been making since 2010 in order to ensure interoperability across all CHAdeMO chargers and all CHAdeMO EVs.

In order to have your charger certified, you will have to reach out to any of the accredited certifier organisations and discuss the details. Here are the seven organisations that evaluate and certify CHAdeMO chargers.

– Idiada (Spain)

– UL Japan (Japan)

– TUV Rheinland Japan (Japan)

– JET (Japan)

– TERTEC (Taiwan)

– DEKRA (Netherlands)

– TUV SUD (Germany)

Only chargers produced by CHAdeMO Regular member manufacturers are eligible for the CHAdeMO certification.

You can find more information about certification here.

Fast Charger Maps of CHAdeMO chargers, provided by our partners PlugShare and ChargeMap, are available on our website (https://www.chademo.com/about-us/fast-charger-maps/). Their charger description usually includes the information on necessary access card etc. which is verified by users.

You may not find enough information on our maps, as the charger installation is accelerating, in which case you may want to consult other charger mapping services to identify the chargers and operators.

Please send us more detailed information about the charger (address, latitudes and longitudes, operator name, etc.) by email to info at chademo.eu (replace “at” with “@”).

If you are an operator and already have a format that you use to share data with charger location service providers, you can send us the same information.

Upon the reception of your information, we shall share the information with our mapping partners so that they can integrate it into the Fast Charger Maps on our website.

Or, you may also go directly to our charge point information partners’ websites, join the community and share information about the chargers you have identified. If you do this, your information will be automatically reflected on our map.

Depending on the battery’s conditions and the temperature, speed of charging (the magnitude of electrical current) is determined by a computer on the EV called ECU and the fast charger follows the instructions by the ECU.

If the ECU estimates that the battery performance is not adequate for fast charging, the EV may stop charging. The charging speed normally gets slower as the remaining battery level recovers, mainly to protect the battery. Therefore, if you try to fast charge when the battery state of charge (SoC) is not low, the charging speed will not be very high. In addition, even if the SoC is low, the charging speed shall slow down as charging proceeds.

Batteries with high charge-discharge efficiency can be charged almost up to 100%.

If we want to use one AC cable for both fast charging and standard charging, we would need to re-design the cable and the connector suitable for high current and high voltage, which makes the cable thicker, heavier and more expensive.

We think it is best to keep the standard charging cable less costly and easy to handle for daily use, while prioritising safety and speed for fast charging, as the frequency of fast charger use is much lower.

500V/125A output is the equivalent of 10 air-conditioners and requires special care. This is why CHAdeMO DC fast charger includes extensive safety measures: before the start of charging, the fast charger conducts double and triple checks to make sure the connection is perfect and cables/connectors are completely insulated. Only after all checking processes are complete and safety is confirmed, the charging starts. The charging process is continuously monitored to ensure safe charging throughout.

In the CHAdeMO fast charging system, the EV and the charger communicate with each other, and it is always the EV that controls the electric current. The EV keeps monitoring the temperature of its battery on a real-time basis and sends current requests to the charger with a 200 ms interval. Faithful to these requests, the charger never sends electric current that could negatively impact the battery.

Indeed, studies show and experts agree that the difference in battery capacity loss between fast-charge-only EVs and normal-charge-only EVs is small and that external ambient temperatures appear to have a higher impact on battery degradation.

Automakers typically offer 5-8-year warranty (or 100,000-160,000 km) for their battery performance.

Once the EV battery has ended its service in an EV, the 2^nd life of it as energy storage unit to power buildings or renewable energy facilities can double the lifetime of a EV battery from 8-10 years to 16-20 years. The Renault-Nissan ELSA project, which is funded under Horizon 2020, develops distributed storage solutions to maturity by combining 2^nd life batteries with an innovative local ICT-based energy management system. ELSA storage systems is applied in six demonstration sites representing several application contexts. BMW has also launched a couple of initiatives to give a second life to used battery packs from its electric vehicles. Together with Bosch and Vattenfall, the German automaker announced a wall mounted battery storage system, not unlike the Tesla Powerwall, using BMW i3 22 kWh or 33kWh battery packs.

The emergence of recycling sector will follow the massification of the EV market. Currently, technological solutions already exist to recycle critical material of batteries such as lithium/ manganese/ cobalt but there is no viable business case yet as there is no sufficient supply.

Communication for fast charging requires high reliability because 500V/125A output of DC fast charging could lead to a fatal accident if any error occurs. CAN has a highly reliable record of usage as a standard communication method for automotive electronic control systems, including upcoming technologies such as autonomous driving. Its higher noise tolerance excels that of PLC as a communication method for the ECU to control the charging process.

It may also be noteworthy that CHAdeMO, Tesla’s proprietary charging system, and the Chinese GB/T, which, together make up the great majority of all chargers in the world, are all using CAN communication.

Yes, there are. You can find some of them here (filter by ‘multi-standard chargers’)

We are an association that develops and maintains the CHAdeMO protocol as well as oversees the certification process of CHAdeMO compatible chargers, and we ourselves do not develop, commercialise or operate chargers.

You can find the list of chargers and companies that produce CHAdeMO-certified chargers on our website here, and you can apply various filters (regional, type of charger, etc.). Once you identify the charger manufacturers that offers a product you may wish to obtain, please send your query directly to them.

The future market will depend upon the development of the ecosystem but there are already some encouraging signs both from the public and private sectors. Many cities, regions and countries are already making plans to enhance the development of the electromobility ecosystem through the creation of financial and other incentives, infrastructure improvement and the switch towards public electric fleet.

The Electric Vehicle Initiative (EVI), gathering the major players of the EV market, set a target of 20 million EVs worldwide (including plug-in hybrid and fuel cell vehicles) by 2020. The European Commission’s EUCO27 scenario (achieving 27% primary energy consumption reduction by 2030) indicates a necessary stock of 34,2 million EVs by 2030 in Europe in order to achieve this target. Electromobility is also at the heart of the strategy of many manufacturers, for instance Volkswagen plans to launch almost 70 new electric models in the next 10 years, while Nissan is targeting 1 million EV sales annually by 2022.

The well-to-wheel CO₂ emissions of the EVs in Europe (specifically the Renault ZOE) are expected to be more than halved between now and 2030, dropping from 72 to 24.5 grams of CO₂ per km, according to the scenario limiting the global temperature rise to no more than 2°C by 2100. This scenario is based on decarbonising the energy system by using renewable energy. Even in countries with high amounts of coal generation such as China, electric vehicles already have lower WTW CO₂ emissions per driven mile than the average ICE vehicle. When considering the possible improvements in internal combustion engine technology, it appears that electric vehicles will still have lower CO₂ emissions per mile by 2030. Moreover, this differential will increase after 2023 as the share of renewable power generation grows faster than the ICE engines can improve. This means that the carbon footprint of EVs will improve over time, and not get worse (Bloomberg&McKinsey: The Future of mobility, 2016).

Electric vehicles can play a role in the electricity grid. Smart charging and price incentives allow to moderate the impact of EV on the grid through services such as so-called valley filling or peak shaving.

Smart charging is an innovative way of recharging electric cars, where charging can be optimised based on the fluctuation of grid loads and the EV owner’s needs. This way, the car can be charged during excess supply or low power demand for a lower fee, thus making economies for the owner, but also utilising excess electricity and shifting some load. This is a win-win situation for both consumers and suppliers. In a narrow sense, smart charging meant only mono-directional charging (meaning that EVs could not feed the grid with the energy stored in their batteries), however today the definition is expanding already to bi-directional charging.

V2X (Vehicle to Everything) technologies enable bi-directional charging, where the car can communicate with power distribution systems, be it the grid, your house or any other building. Through V2X, we can reach high energy efficiencies, as the car becomes not only a “smart consumer” but also a “smart supplier” of electricity.

CHAdeMO is the only international DC charging protocol that enables V2X, with mass production EVs and V2X bi-directional systems already available in the market. As the only international protocol to standardise the V2X functionality, CHAdeMO Association contributes to the innovation in this domain, as CHAdeMO is implied in a variety of V2X demonstration projects as well as in commercial applications in the world.

Projects using V2X capabilities of the CHAdeMO protocol have been going on around the world since 2012 and their scale and numbers are growing. These demonstration projects (of which some have become commercial-base services) provide valuable findings and data for larger-scale, market deployment of V2H/ V2G technology.

FCVs including the Toyota Mirai and Honda Clarity are already equipped with CHAdeMO inlets, allowing power feedback using the CHAdeMO technology.

IEC has published 4 fast charging standards in the world. The German automakers developed CCS Combo 2-EVs that Germany promoted. While the Japanese government accepts all IEC standard chargers to be installed, since the EV infrastructure in Japan was already well-equipped with the CHAdeMO standard, we presume that the German automakers decided to utilise the existing infrastructure to maximise the benefit for the users.

The German automakers and CHAdeMO Association consensually validated the technical information concerning the safety and compatibility when they adopted the CHAdeMO protocol.

As for the European market, CHAdeMO standard chargers and EVs had already been well established in some countries before CCS EV/infrastructure was introduced. Therefore, multi-standard chargers with both CHAdeMO and Combo 2 connectors are the de facto standard today.

At the moment, CHAdeMO does not have a plan to develop adapters, because there is little demand, and because ensuring safety of fast DC charging using adapters to convert the interface shall entail a great deal of technical challenges.

Tesla provides a Model S/X– CHAdeMO adapter, which  you can find on Tesla’s website.  Alternatively, you can get in touch with your local Tesla sales point.

To the best of our knowledge, there are Tesla super chargers as well as some CCS chargers available, as the Japanese market does not exclude other standards. Chargers equipped with other international standards are also eligible for subsidies from the Japanese government.

CHAdeMO is published by IEC along with Combo 1(US), Combo 2(DE), and GB/T(CN) standards under IEC 61851-23 for charging system; IEC 61851-24 for communication; and IEC 62196-3 for connector. CHAdeMO is an EN standard recognised by CENELEC, along with Combo 2, as well as an iEEE standard (2030.1.1).

CHAdeMO Association asks companies that wish to develop and commercialise CHAdeMO fast chargers to become our Regular member and have their chargers certified according to the CHAdeMO specifications in order to ensure compatibility and safety.

Both CHAdeMO and Combo are published as international standards by IEC in the same standards (IEC 61851-23 for charging system; IEC 61851-24 for communication; and IEC 62196-3 for connector). Today the multi-standard chargers (equipped with both CHAdeMO and Combo connectors) are the de facto standard, as there is strong momentum to collaborate in the fast charging infrastructure in order to move forward towards the common goal of accelerating EV adoption.

To ensure and improve the convenience of all EV users, the Association works with any countries and regions with a collaborative approach advocating for “chargers for all,” but should there be movement of excluding CHAdeMO from any market, the Association shall respond to rectify the situation.

This refers to the Directive for the Alternative Fuels Infrastructure, which was part of the Clean Power for Transport package proposed by the European Commission in January 2013. In this package, in order to break the dependence of European transport on fossil fuels and cut back on greenhouse emissions, the Commission aimed to set out a long-term policy framework to guide technology development and investments in the deployment of various alternative fuels including electric, hydrogen, natural gas, etc.

The Alternative Fuels Infrastructure Directive (2014/94/EU) was adopted in October 2014.

The objective of it was to have a single European market in this field, and to set 1) minimum national targets for national infrastructure build-up, such as EV charge point numbers, and 2) common technical specifications.

The negotiation process between the European Commission, the European Parliament and the Council, called the Trilogues, established that the more “general approach” will be adopted for the point about DC fast charging technology standard. Recognizing its pervasiveness in European market, the final directive leaves the door open to CHAdeMO as well as to other standards, as long as there is one common Combo 2 connector. Multi-standard chargers equipped with both CHAdeMO and Combo 2 can be installed for as long as possible. The standards can be reviewed and modified by 2020 depending on the evolution of the market.

On top of this, it is clearly stated in the law’s recital section that this choice for the EU common standard should not affect countries and regions having already invested in other charging technologies,  nor the already existing chargers, nor EV users.

It is also important to note that “high power charging” is defined as “a recharging point that allows for a transfer of electricity to an electric vehicle with a power of more than 22 kW”, so the European common plug requirement does NOT apply to DC fast chargers up to 22kW nor to bi-directional V2X with up to 22kW.

CHAdeMO supports the general idea of this initiative, that is to boost the deployment of alternative fuels infrastructure Europe-wide by asking all member states to set a national policy framework for the infrastructure build-up.

We welcome the decision by the European Union to protect the interest of the early movers, both the current EV owners and infrastructure operators, as per our position statement published in April 2014.

The Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (2010/31/EU) is one of the main pillars of the EU’s energy policy, establishing minimum energy performance requirements for buildings in all Member States. The Directive also sets a nearly zero-emission target for new buildings by the end of 2020.

The revised Directive (2018/844/EU) entered into force on 9th July 2018, with the goal of accelerating the cost-effective renovation of existing residential and non-residential buildings, transforming the buildings into a highly energy efficient and decarbonized building stock by 2050. Other aims of the directive include supporting electromobility infrastructure deployment in parkades and introducing new provisions aimed to enhance smart technologies and technical building systems, including automation.

A multi-standard charger is equipped with more than one connector / socket, which allows to serve EVs with different charging inlets. Typically equipped with multiple charging cables, just like Petrol, Petrol un-leaded, Diesel or LPG arms at the petrol stations today, EV drivers only have to pick the right connector for the EV.

Many of European charger manufacturers produce multi-standard chargers in the market, which are today the de facto standard. The industry is aligned that these are the way forward to service all EV drivers.

Multi-standard chargers are practical because all EV drivers can be served. For investors and operators, this guarantees a faster recovery of investment with a bigger customer base. Automakers are also able to compete with cars (as they should!) and not with charging standards.

The EU is constantly supporting the deployment of multi-standard fast chargers. Under the TEN-T projects, about 557 chargers were installed across Europe between the period 2013-2015, with a total of €17,71 million granted by the EU. The succeeding CEF framework follows the same path with about 948 multi-standard fast chargers to be deployed by 2019 and with at least €30 million contribution from the EU. What is noteworthy is that in many of these EU projects, automakers such as BMW, Nissan, Renault and Volkswagen are participating together, regardless of the type of fast charging inlets they use. Furthermore, the CEF projects show an increased involvement of Member States with countries participating such as Poland, Spain and Portugal.

In 2017, renewables generated 30% of Europe’s electricity for the first time (mostly wind, solar and biomass). (Sandbag and Agora study “The European Power Sector in 20017“)

According to International Energy Agency (IEA) World Energy Outlook 2016, if the current rate of growth continues , by 2040 the share of the renewables will rise to 50% and the majority of renewables-based generation will be competitive without any subsidies.

EV carbon footprint clearly depends on the sources used to produce electricity in Member States. The European average for 2014 is of 275.9g CO₂ / KWh. Also, WTW CO₂ emissions of EVs in 2015 were estimated by the JRC at 78g CO₂ equivalent compared to 185g for conventional gasoline and 145g for conventional diesel engines (DG MOVE/ Cowi 2015 study “State of the Art on Alternative Fuels Transport Systems”).

In 2016, the share of electricity generated from renewable sources reached almost one third (29%) of all gross electricity generation in the EU. – See here.

In 2030,  80%  of European  electricity  will  be  carbon  free (half from renewable and half from nuclear electricity generation) (DG MOVE/ Cowi 2015 study “State of the Art on Alternative Fuels Transport Systems”; p.16).

Usually the abbreviation ‘EV’ refers to Battery electric vehicles and Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles as these are the most produced types. However, there exist other EV configurations too.

The European Environment Agency in its 2016 “Electric vehicles in Europe” report distinguishes six types of EVs:

• Hybrid vehicles (combining an internal combustion engine and an electric motor)
• Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) (powered by an electric motor -supplied by a rechargeable battery- and an internal combustion engine)
• Battery electric vehicles (BEVs) (powered solely by an electric motor, using electricity stored in an on-board battery)
• Range extended electric vehicle (powered by an electric motor -supplied by a rechargeable battery- and an internal combustion engine that has no direct link to the wheels, but acts as an electricity generator)
• Fuel cell electric vehicle (powered by an electric motor that gets energy from a fuel cell ‘stack’ that uses hydrogen from an on-board tank combined with oxygen from the air)

The purchasing price of today’s best-selling EV models (Renault ZOE, Nissan LEAF) is still slightly higher than their equivalent ICEs models indeed. However, costs will come down together with the massification of the market, the related economies of scale and the progresses in batteries technology. For instance, the new Renault ZOE which was launched in 2016, has doubled its range compared to the previous version for only a very minor price increase. To that, you have to add the fact that refuelling and maintenance costs of BEVs (battery electric vehicles) are incomparably lower than those of the ICEs. The recent Element Energy study commissioned by BEUC demonstrates that “by 2024 the average 4-year cost of running an electric vehicle should match that of a petrol car”.

Today, most of the individual car journeys are home/work commuting, with an occupancy rate of a bit more than 1 and a distance of less than 80 km. The EV is a perfect solution for these kinds of needs. BEVs have been improving their range over the past years for light personal vehicles (Renault Zoe, Nissan Leaf, Chevrolet Bolt, Opel Ampera, that are now offering a “real-driving conditions” autonomy of 300km or above, per charge) and small vans (e.g. Renault Kangoo, Nissan e-NV200, around 150-160km per charge).

On a life-cycle basis, EVs are already very competitive regarding CO₂ emissions (compared to other propulsion modes). This CO₂ intensity will further decrease in the future, based on the increasing share of renewables in the energy mix.

With the average carbon intensity of the power sector (based on the EU28 energy mix in 2010), electric vehicles emit less GHG than their internal combustion equivalents: 78g WTW compared to 105g for PHEVs and 185g for Gasoline engines (DG MOVE/ Cowi 2015 study “State of the Art on Alternative Fuels Transport Systems.”). Most GHG emissions in WTW calculations occur during the use phase. BEV are assumed to score best in 2030 with an expected reduction of lifecycle GHG emissions of 50% between 2012 and 2030. During the vehicle production, the battery used in PHEVs and BEVs is the most critical component in terms of GHG emissions contributing 30-50% of total emissions, mainly due to the materials and quantities required for the battery production. Also, since batteries are increasingly getting re-used for energy storage purposes, their overall GHG emissions will further decrease over their lifetime.

There already are over 120 000 charging stations across the EU-28 member states, which is not a scarce number! New charging points continue to be installed and this number will continue to grow as the countries are being asked by the AFI directive to implement their deployment plan of alternative fuels infrastructure.

For instance, Germany is planning to have 36,000 normal charging points and 7,000 fast charging points by 2020. In France, the Environment Minister announced that the government is targeting 1 million EV charging points within three years, of which 900,000 at private residences and 100,000 open to the public.

Companies like RWE, E.ON or EDF created dedicated company divisions or subsidiaries for electromobility in order to match the demand of the charging infrastructure.

According to Element energy study on TCO, all powertrains (except H2 fuel cells) on average have lower ownership costs in 2030 compared with petrol ICEs in 2015, despite a backdrop of rising fuel and electricity prices. BEVs reach near TCO purchase price parity with diesel ICEs -the cheapest powertrain- for the first owner in 2030. Over the life of the vehicle, the TCO of BEVs falls significantly below conventional vehicles, even after the acquisition price of home charging points is included.

Umweltbundesamt foresees in Germany a 30-40 Twh additional electricity demand due to electric vehicles in 2030. This represents a manageable 6% of the projected total demand. Public fast-charging stations don’t impact the grid much because they are part of commercial grids that have transformers and other equipment sized to accommodate large loads.

According to EURELECTRIC, “(even) If all the cars on the road today in Europe were electric, e-mobility would account for a 24% increase in total electricity demand, which could be handled without additional generation and transmission capacity.” (Unlocking the potential of electric vehicles – EURELECTRIC publishes paper on smart charging (24 March 2015).

Given the current EV penetration rate of below 2%, we trust that there is little impact on power supply. However, in case 100% penetration is achieved today, adds EURELECTRIC, “if those cars are not charged in an intelligent and coordinated way, their impact in terms of peak demand at certain times could be much higher. And we think smart charging is the answer.” (EURELECTRIC Secretary General Hans ten Berge).