CHARGER INFORMATION DISTRIBUTION DEVICE

• US 20130335005A1
• Filed: 01/24/2012
• Published: 12/19/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 08/10/2011
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Hitachi Solutions Limited (Hitachi, Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Hitachi Solutions Limited (Hitachi, Ltd.)
• Inventors: Ohama, Nobuyuki
• Application Number:
  US14/002,007
• Publication Number:
  US 20130335005A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 320/106
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2240/80 Time limits
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2250/16 by display
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2250/20 by driver identification
• 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 3/12 Recording operating variables ; Monitoring of operating variables
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/305 Communication interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/63 in response to network capacity
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/65 involving identification of vehicles or their battery types
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0284 Time or distance, e.g. usage of parking meters or taximeters
• 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: Y02E 60/00 Enabling technologies; Technologies with a potential or indirect contribution to GHG emissions mitigation
• 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 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 charger management device for a vehicle equipped with a secondary battery includes a charging data acquisition unit that acquires at least one of items of a charger user identification number, a charging spot ID identifying a charger installed location, a charging start time, a battery remaining amount at start of charging, and a battery remaining amount at end of charging; a charging data rearranging/separating unit that rearranges and separates the charging data by the at least one of the items; a charging spot ID utilization order calculation unit that calculates in what order charging spots are being utilized on an item by item basis; a charging spot successive utilization tendency computation unit that computes, on the basis of the result of calculation by the charging spot ID utilization order calculation unit, in what order the charging spots are being used successively.

Claims

1. A charger management device for performing state monitoring and user authentication for a charger for a vehicle equipped with a secondary battery (chargeable battery), comprising:

a charging data acquisition unit that acquires at least one of items of a charger user identification number, a charging spot ID identifying a charger installed location, a charging start time, a battery remaining amount at start of charging, and a battery remaining amount at end of charging;

a charging data rearranging/separating unit that rearranges and separates (sorts) the charging data by the at least one of the items;

a charging spot ID utilization order calculation unit that calculates in what order charging spots are being utilized on an item by item basis;

a charging spot successive utilization tendency computation unit that computes, on the basis of the result of calculation by the charging spot ID utilization order calculation unit, in what order the charging spots are being used successively; and

a successive utilization tendency distribution unit that distributes a computation result to a user terminal held by a user.

2. The charger management device according to claim 1, wherein:

the charging data rearranging/separating unit separates the charging data by the user identification number and rearranges the data by the charging start time at predetermined regular time intervals;

the charging spot ID utilization order calculation unit calculates in what order the charging spot IDs are being utilized on the basis of all of the sorted charging data; and

the charging spot successive utilization tendency computation unit derives a charging spot successive utilization tendency indicating at which location the next charging is often performed after charging is performed at one location.

3. The charger management device according to claim 2, further comprising:

an inter-charging spot distance acquisition unit that acquires the distance between the charging spots; and

a charging spot elimination unit that, when the charging spot successive utilization tendency is derived, compares a first capacity value which is the difference between an at-end battery remaining amount at the time of previous charging and an at-start battery remaining amount at the time of ongoing current charging, with a second capacity value which is a minimum required battery capacity between the charging spots that is calculated from a maximum range that can be travelled based on the charger and the inter-charging spot distance, excluding from the charging data when the second capacity value is greater than the first capacity value.

4. The charger management device according to claim 1, wherein the successive utilization tendency distribution unit distributes a successive utilization tendency with regard to all of the charging spots being managed to the user terminal regardless of whether charging is currently ongoing or not.

5. The charger management device according to claim 1, wherein the successive utilization tendency distribution unit distributes a charging time interval at each charging spot to the user terminal simultaneously with a successive utilization tendency with regard to all of the charging spots being managed, regardless of whether charging is currently ongoing or not.

6. The charger management device according to claim 1, wherein the successive utilization tendency distribution unit performs distribution to a remotely managed device that remotely manages the charger, instead of to the user terminal.

7. The charger management device according to claim 1, further comprising an additional service implementing means that performs information distribution additionally to charging service.

8. The charger management device according to claim 7, wherein the additional service implementing means is implemented as bundle software on an OSGi framework.

9. The charger management device according to claim 3, comprising:

a statistics acquisition means that acquires statistics data for the charging data of which the second capacity value is greater than the first capacity value; and

a communication means that transmits the statistics data to a manager terminal device.

10. A charger management method for performing state monitoring and user authentication for a charger for a vehicle equipped with a secondary battery (chargeable battery), the method comprising:

a charging data acquisition step of acquiring charging data including at least one of items of a charger user identification number, a charging spot ID identifying a charger installed location, a charging start time, a battery remaining amount at start of charging, and a battery remaining amount at end of charging;

a charging data rearranging/separating step of rearranging and separating (sorting) the charging data by the at least one of the items;

a charging spot ID utilization order calculation step of calculating in what order charging spots are being utilized on an item by item basis;

a charging spot successive utilization tendency computation step of computing in what order the charging spots are being successively used, on the basis of the result of calculation in the charging spot ID utilization order calculation step; and

a successive utilization tendency distribution step of distributing a computation result to a user terminal held by a user.

11. The charger management method according to claim 10, wherein:

the charging data rearranging/separating step separates the charging data by the user identification number and rearranges the data by the charging start time at predetermined regular time intervals;

the charging spot ID utilization order calculation step calculates in what order the charging spot IDs are being utilized on the basis of all of the separated charging data; and

the charging spot successive utilization tendency computation step derives a charging spot successive utilization tendency indicating at which location the next charging is often performed after charging is performed at one location.

12. The charger management method according to claim 10, further comprising:

an inter-charging spot distance acquisition step of acquiring the distance between the charging spots; and

a charging spot elimination step of, when the charging spot successive utilization tendency is derived, comparing a first capacity value which is the difference between an at-end battery remaining amount at the time of previous charging and an at-start battery remaining amount at the time of ongoing current charging, with a second capacity value which is a minimum required battery capacity between the charging spots that is calculated from a maximum range that can be travelled based on the charger and the inter-charging spot distance, and eliminating from the charging data when the second capacity value is greater than the first capacity value.

13. The charger management method according to claim 12, comprising:

a statistics acquisition step of acquiring statistics data for the charging data of which the second capacity value is greater than the first capacity value; and

a communication step of transmitting the statistics data to a manager terminal device.

14. A non-transitory computer-readable recording medium on which a program for causing a computer to implement the charger management method according to claim 10 is recorded.