Skip to main content

BMW tests street light EV charger

BMW is to run a pilot project in Munich to test a newly-developed an electric car charging station which the company says can be can be grafted straight onto the existing local authority street lighting infrastructure. BMW said it has made two prototype ‘Light and Charge’ street lights which combine efficient light emitting diodes (LED) with the company's ChargeNow recharging stations for electric cars. "Seamless charging infrastructure is essential if we want to see more electric vehicles on the road
November 11, 2014 Read time: 2 mins
1731 BMW is to run a pilot project in Munich to test a newly-developed an electric car charging station which the company says can be can be grafted straight onto the existing local authority street lighting infrastructure.

BMW said it has made two prototype ‘Light and Charge’ street lights which combine efficient light emitting diodes (LED) with the company's ChargeNow recharging stations for electric cars.

"Seamless charging infrastructure is essential if we want to see more electric vehicles on the road in our cities in the future," Peter Schwarzenbauer, member of the Board of Management of BMW, said.

The company claims the charging stations can be used by as many drivers as possible, regardless of vehicle model and electricity provider.

Two street lights are already installed in front of the BMW headquarters. Drivers will be able to pay to charge their cars via a mobile phone app.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • FOTsis targets ‘socially inclusive’ cooperative ITS
    December 5, 2013
    The FOTsis project addresses the imbalances between the vehicular and infrastructure sides of cooperative ITS infrastructures and looks to ensure road operators can help to enrich future technology applications. By Jason Barnes. Several developments have conspired to push the vehicular side of cooperative infrastructures/cooperative ITS to the fore in recent years. The automotive industry’s rather shorter product development and lifecycles combined with economic slowdown in many regions gave rise to the not
  • Foundation funds research for informed campaigning
    April 29, 2015
    ITS International talks to Professor Stephen Glaister, director of the transport research and lobbying organisation, the RAC Foundation. It is through the eyes of an economist that Professor Stephen Glaister, emeritus professor of transport and infrastructure at Imperial College London and director of the RAC Foundation, views current and future transport problems. Having spent 30 years at the London School of Economics and another 10 at Imperial, the move to the RAC Foundation was a radical departure from
  • Hamburg’s on-demand alternative to commuting by car
    December 5, 2017
    As Hamburg is confirmed as the host for the 2021 ITS World Congress, David Crawford looks at the city’s moves towards enabling MaaS-type operations. Germany’s second-largest city, Hamburg, is pinning its civic reputation on having its promised all-electric, on-demand, shuttle bus ridesharing service up and running by 2018. Partners in the three-year project are regional metro and bus service provider Hamburger Hochbahn and Volkswagen Group’s Berlinbased mobility innovation subsidiary Moia, which was set
  • Debating road user charging systems
    January 26, 2012
    Are pre-launch trials of charging systems the way to improve public acceptance? Or is the real key a more robust political attitude? Here, leading system suppliers discuss the issue. The use of distance-based Road User Charging (RUC) is now well established, at least for heavy goods vehicles on strategic roads. However demand management for all vehicles, whether a distance-based charge or some form of cordon scheme, has yet to make significant progress. This is in spite of the logic and equity of RUC being