Skip to main content

ReachNow installs 20 public EV charging stations in Seattle

BMW’s ReachNow car-sharing service has installed the first of 20 Light & Charge electric vehicle (EV) charging locations in Seattle, US, as part of a US$1.2 million investment by the BMW Group. Seattle is the first city in North America to make the award-winning Light & Charge system, which turns existing streetlights into EV charging stations, available to the public.
May 23, 2017 Read time: 2 mins
BMW’s ReachNow car-sharing service has installed the first of 20 Light & Charge electric vehicle (EV) charging locations in Seattle, US, as part of a US$1.2 million investment by the BMW Group. Seattle is the first city in North America to make the award-winning Light & Charge system, which turns existing streetlights into EV charging stations, available to the public.


The Light & Charge system, developed by BMW together with its partner, eluminocity US, transforms existing street and parking lot light poles into connected nodes on a smart city network. The system combines LED lighting, EV charging and a sensor bus that senses various parameters and connects the site to the cloud. The sensor bus also provides edge-computing power for other connected devices nearby.

In Seattle, each Light & Charge site will include one ChargePoint DC Fast Charger and two to four AC, Level II chargers. The chargers all run on the ChargePoint network and will all be available to the public and compatible with any EV that has a standard SAE J1772 charging port.

The addition of Light & Charge stations in Seattle will also allow ReachNow to expand its shared fleet of EVs. Today, the electric BMW i3 vehicle makes up 10 per cent of the total ReachNow fleet and, with less than a year on the road, ReachNow’s shared electric fleet claims to have saved more than 55 tons of CO2 emissions.

Related Content

  • New PoE networking switches from Antaira
    October 21, 2014
    Antaira Technologies has expanded its industrial PoE networking infrastructure family with the LNP-0702G-SFP (48~55VDC) and LNP-0702G-SFP-24 (12~36VDC) 7-port industrial PoE+ gigabit unmanaged Ethernet switches. Each unit is designed with five gigabit Ethernet ports that are IEEE 802.3at compliant (PoE+) on ports 1-4 (data and power output maximum 30W/port) and are compatible with IEEE 802.3 af PoE. The unit has two fibre dual rate (100/1000) SFP slots. The series support MDI/MDI-X functions and 9
  • Traffic management to the fore at Vision 2014
    December 8, 2014
    Colin Sowman reviews some of the traffic-related exhibits at the 2014 Vision Show in Stuttgart. Traffic was a major theme at this years’ Vision Show in Stuttgart and several manufacturers used the exhibition to highlight their traffic-related equipment and applications.
  • North Texas to get 511 traffic information system
    April 11, 2013
    A new source of traffic information will shortly be available to drivers on the central expressway in Collin and Dallas counties, Texas, with the implementation of the 511 system which will provide travel information by telephone and on the web. The system is due to be tested from the end of April and will be formally launched in the summer. The project involves several cities and transportation agencies that are combining their information for the first time. "The idea of pulling it all together at one l
  • Colorado governor announces Connected and Autonomous vehicles day
    December 11, 2017
    Colorado’s governor Jon Hickenlooper declared 4 December as Connected and Autonomous Vehicle Day following a visit with civic leaders and corporate executives to an autonomous vehicle (AV) technology demonstration at Panasonic’s Denver facility. Through a new partnership it plans to deploy AV technology next to the building, in Spring 2018. The event also featured EasyMile’s autonomous shuttle inaugural journey to Peña Station as well as the opening of its new North American headquarters.