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Home Joint Office of Energy and Transportation

Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Standards and Reliability

The Joint Office of Energy and Transportation helps industry advance technical solutions and innovation that enable electric vehicle drivers to experience a safe and successful charge the first time, every time.

electric power substation

With a goal to create a measurable, consistent, reliable and innovation-ready electric vehicle charging infrastructure, we:

  • Lead on creating a single source of truth for understanding the end-to-end electric vehicle charging ecosystem and all of its interacting components. With this in place, we are able to identify gaps and accordingly guide and support the development of common standards and protocols like J3400, ISO 15118-2, public key infrastructure to support Universal Plug & Charge, electrical metrology and traceability to SI units and charger-to-charger backend communications including through the Open Charge Point Protocol (OCPP) and Open Charge Point Interface (OCPI).

  • Convene and coordinate to help solve problems that span domain silos. This includes payment systems, requirements for adapters and connectors, methods to measure the quality of the charging experience and charging infrastructure reliability.

  • Promote opportunities that expand innovation within the electric vehicle infrastructure, such as Megawatt Charging System (MCS) for medium- and heavy-duty vehicles, vehicle-to-grid (V2G) systems, open-source software tools and tighter software and communication interfaces between the charging infrastructure and the electric grid (VGI).

With expertise in metrology, protocol and standards development, and data interoperability from national labs and real-world private sector experience, the Joint Office leads or contributes to projects including:

  • Unified measurement and definitions for the consumer’s charging experience, including guidelines for common key performance indicators.

  • Standards development for plugs and adapters, including J3400 and UL 2522.

  • Common technology platforms for creating interoperability among software and hardware in the electric mobility ecosystem, including open-source approaches and common APIs.

  • Energy measurement and pricing using proven metrology practices.

Charging Connector and Adapter Compatibility

Advancing standards like J3400 and UL 2522 to simplify the mobility ecosystem for greater industry innovation and improved user experience

Data and Communications Protocol Interoperability

Catalyzing innovation and a better user experience with open-source technology and common platforms like Universal Plug & Charge and its EVPKI framework

Charging User Experience and Reliability

Defining charging experience metrics and data across industry

Measurement and Price Transparency

Using a proven metrology approach to measuring electricity so consumers get what they pay for

Research and Tools

News and Events

Partnerships and Supporting Offices

The Joint Office collaborates with other government agencies and offices, as well as research partners, on this work.

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