CHAdeMO’s general assembly took place on 27 May, a very hot day in Tokyo. The CHAdeMO members in the room and elsewhere voted to approve the new President, Takafumi Anegawa, to take office immediately. Toshiyuki SHIGA, who had served as the President of CHAdeMO Association since 2011, steps down after having paved way for the harmonisation of CHAdeMO with China’s GB/T plug.

Takafumi Anegawa in his first speech as the new president, looked back and told the history of CHAdeMO from the early years of CHAdeMO to date  and congratulated the members for their achievements thus far. He also shared his passion for electric driving – he is an avid EV driver – and encouraged the members in the room to continue exploring creative ways to benefit from the CHAdeMO technology.

Dave Yoshida, the Secretary General of CHAdeMO, has reported to the members in the room that given the result of the vote by the members, the Board of CHAdeMO has decided to develop the next CHAdeMO standard based on ChaoJi, the code name for the new plug China Electricity Council and CHAdeMO are co-developing, confirming the harmonization of the two standards, GB/T and CHAdeMO, in the next version. It was also reported that new versions of CHAdeMO, for both heavy-duty vehicles (e.g. pantograph) as well as for LEVs (e.g. 5-20kW or DC 20-120V) are being developed.

In the exhibition space next to the conference room, the prototype for the new GB/T – CHAdeMO collaboration inlets were exhibited. The connector assembly side could not make it to the general assembly due to the customs issues, but here is a photo of one of the prototype connectors already going through a multitude of tests in China.