Methods and apparatuses for charging of electric vehicles

• US 10,586,258 B2
• Filed: 12/28/2018
• Issued: 03/10/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 10/19/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Zeco Systems Pte Ltd. (Shell Plc)
• Original Assignee: Zeco Systems Pte Ltd. (Shell Plc)
• Inventors: Khoo, Lin-Zhuang, Mahabir, Ron, Siew, Terence, Noma, Renaldo, Jhanji, Neeraj
• Primary Examiner(s): Azad, Md
• Application Number:
  US16/236,178
• Publication Number:
  US 20190139107A1
• Time in Patent Office: 438 Days
• Field of Search: 700286
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2240/12 Speed
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2240/545 Temperature
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2240/622 by satellite navigation
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2240/72 Charging station selection relying on external data
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2260/52 drive range estimation, e.g. of estimation of available travel distance
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2260/54 Energy consumption estimation
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2260/58 Departure time prediction
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2270/32 of electricity
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/14 Conductive energy transfer
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/305 Communication interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/31 Charging columns specially adapted for electric vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/63 in response to network capacity
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/64 Optimising energy costs, e.g. responding to electricity rates
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/65 involving identification of vehicles or their battery types
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/66 Data transfer between charging stations and vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/665 Methods related to measuring, billing or payment
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/67 Controlling two or more charging stations
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/68 Off-site monitoring or control, e.g. remote control
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3476 using point of interest [POI] information, e.g. a route passing visible POIs
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3492 employing speed data or traffic data, e.g. real-time or historical traffic control systems for road vehicles involving transmission of navigation instructions to the vehicle G08G1/0968
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/26 : Power supply means, e.g. regulation thereof for memories G11C
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/02 : Reservations, e.g. for tickets, services or events
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1093 : Calendar-based scheduling for persons or groups
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/102 : Bill distribution or payments
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/24 : Credit schemes, i.e. "pay after"
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/409 : Device specific authentication in transaction processing
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0206 : Price or cost determination based on market factors
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0283 : Price estimation or determination
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/06 : Energy or water supply
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/40 : Business processes related to the transportation industry shipping G06Q10/083
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/144 : on portable or mobile units, e.g. personal digital assistant [PDA]
• CPC Class Codes: H01M 10/44 : Methods for charging or discharging circuits for charging H02J7/00
• CPC Class Codes: H01M 2220/20 : Batteries in motive systems, e.g. vehicle, ship, plane
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 2310/48 : for electric vehicles [EV] or hybrid vehicles [HEV]
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 3/322 : the battery being on-board an electric or hybrid vehicle, e.g. vehicle to grid arrangements [V2G], power aggregation, use of the battery for network load balancing, coordinated or cooperative battery charging
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 7/00034 : Charger exchanging data with an electronic device, i.e. telephone, whose internal battery is under charge
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 7/0013 : acting upon several batteries simultaneously or sequentially H02J7/1423 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 25/20 : Repeater circuits; Relay circuits
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/10 : for controlling access to devices or network resources
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 : in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 : Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/023 : using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/40 : for vehicles, e.g. vehicle-to-pedestrians [V2P]
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 : in wireless communication networks
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 60/00 : Enabling technologies; Technologies with a potential or indirect contribution to GHG emissions mitigation
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 60/10 : Energy storage using batteries
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/70 : Energy storage systems for electromobility, e.g. batteries
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/7072 : Electromobility specific charging systems or methods for batteries, ultracapacitors, supercapacitors or double-layer capacitors
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/72 : Electric energy management in electromobility
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/12 : Electric charging stations
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/14 : Plug-in electric vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/16 : Information or communication technologies improving the operation of electric vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/167 : Systems integrating technologies related to power network operation and communication or information technologies for supporting the interoperability of electric or hybrid vehicles, i.e. smartgrids as interface for battery charging of electric vehicles [EV] or hybrid vehicles [HEV]
• CPC Class Codes: Y04S 10/126 : the energy generation units being or involving electric vehicles [EV] or hybrid vehicles [HEV], i.e. power aggregation of EV or HEV, vehicle to grid arrangements [V2G]
• CPC Class Codes: Y04S 30/14 : Details associated with the interoperability, e.g. vehicle recognition, authentication, identification or billing

Abstract

A method controlling reservations at an electric vehicle charging station is disclosed. The method includes: sending, from the mobile device, the charge transfer request for the electric vehicle of a first user at an electric vehicle charging station to the cloud server, wherein a user of the mobile device is associated with the electric vehicle to be charged; in response to authorizing the charge transfer request using identification information and credit account information received from the mobile device, charging the electric vehicle of the first user at the electric vehicle charging station for a first charging session; reserving a second charging session for an electric vehicle of a second user; and facilitating communication with the first user and the second user to modify the scheduled end time of the first charging session for the first user an amount of time and modify the scheduled start time of the second charging session of the second user an amount of time.

Claims

1. A method of controlling reservations at an electric vehicle charging station, the method comprising:

receiving, at a mobile device, a charge transfer request for an electric vehicle of a first user directly from the electric vehicle charging station, wherein a user of the mobile device is associated with the electric vehicle to be charged, wherein the electric vehicle charging station does not transmit a charge transfer request for the electric vehicle to a cloud server without relaying through the mobile device;

sending, from the mobile device, the charge transfer request for the electric vehicle of the first user directly to the cloud server, wherein the charge transfer request relayed from the mobile device includes identification information and funding credit account information;

in response to authorizing the charge transfer request using identification information and credit account information received from the mobile device, charging the electric vehicle of the first user in a charging space at the electric vehicle charging station for a first charging session, the charging session having a scheduled end time;

reserving a second charging session for an electric vehicle of a second user in the charging space, the second charging session being scheduled to have a scheduled start time at or after the scheduled end time of the first charging session;

facilitating communication between the first user and the second user to modify the scheduled end time of the first charging session for the first user an amount of time and correspondingly modify the scheduled start time of the second charging session of the second user an amount of time.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein if the second user agrees to a modified second charging session, reimbursing the second user for any inconvenience from the first user.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising facilitating a payment between the first user and the second user.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising facilitating a response that includes a notification of acceptance or rejection of the communication regarding modification of the scheduled start time and the scheduled end time.

5. A method of controlling reservations at an electric vehicle charging station, the method comprising:

sending, from the mobile device, the charge transfer request for the electric vehicle of a first user at an electric vehicle charging station to the cloud server, wherein a user of the mobile device is associated with the electric vehicle to be charged, wherein the charge transfer request relayed from the mobile device includes identification information and funding credit account information;

in response to authorizing the charge transfer request using identification information and credit account information received from the mobile device, charging the electric vehicle of the first user at the electric vehicle charging station for a first charging session, the charging session having a scheduled end time;

reserving a second charging session for an electric vehicle of a second user, the second charging session being scheduled to have a scheduled start time at or after the scheduled end time of the first charging session;

facilitating communication with the first user and the second user to modify the scheduled end time of the first charging session for the first user an amount of time and modify the scheduled start time of the second charging session of the second user an amount of time.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising facilitating a response to the communication that includes acceptance or rejection of the communication regarding modification of the scheduled start time and/or the scheduled end time.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the response comprises a reservation ticket for using the charging station.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the reservation ticket comprises at least one of the following:

a date, a time, an amount of time remaining on the reservation ticket, a valuation of the reservation ticket, and a designated electric vehicle charging station.

9. The method of claim 5, wherein the mobile device and a cloud server use data from an in-vehicle telematics platform to forecast an energy load at the electric vehicle charging station.

10. The method of claim 5, wherein the mobile device and a cloud server use data from an in-vehicle telematics platform to reserve a charging space for use by the electric vehicle at the electric vehicle charging station.

11. The method of claim 5, wherein the modification of the scheduled end time of the first charging session for the first user, the modification the scheduled start time of the second charging session of the second user, or both, are performed at least partially to reduce an energy load at the electric vehicle charging station.

12. A method of queuing available charging spaces at an electric vehicle charging station, comprising:

determining a distance between a first geolocation of a mobile device associated with an electric vehicle and a second geolocation of the electric vehicle charging station; and

sending a message, from the electric vehicle charging station, directly to the mobile device based on the distance from the electric vehicle charging station to the mobile device, the message including a notification to a user of the mobile device regarding the availability of charging spaces at the electric vehicle charging station when the mobile device is expected to arrive based on the determined distance,

wherein if no slots are expected to be available at the electric vehicle charging station when the electric vehicle is expected to arrive, the notification includes an amount of time before a charging space at the electric vehicle charging station is expected to become available based on the determined distance, and if one or more charging spaces are expected to be available at the electric vehicle charging station when the electric vehicle is expected to arrive, the notification includes a remaining number of available charging spaces expected to be available at the electric vehicle charging station when the electric vehicle is expected to arrive based on the determined distance.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising receiving a request from the user to be notified when a charging space is available.

14. The method of claim 12, further comprising notifying the user that the charging space is available.

15. The method of claim 12, further comprising:

sending a request for acceptance or rejection of the charging space to the user; and

receiving a response accepting or rejecting the request by the user.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein accepting the request places a hold on the charging space that prevents a different user from using the charging space.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein rejecting the request enables the charging space to be available to a subsequent user.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein rejecting the request initiates notification of a subsequent user that the charging space is available.

19. The method of claim 12, wherein the message comprises one or more of a grid demand response instruction, a grid demand response schedule, a session report, billing data, electricity price data, fault data, and usage data.

20. The method of claim 12, wherein the mobile device and a cloud server use data from an in-vehicle telematics platform to forecast an energy load or reserve a charging space for use by the electric vehicle.