Home EV charging is fine if you have your own garage. Sadly, it’s a real pain to organize for those stuck parking on the street, and this can make owning an EV highly impractical. Salvation may be at hand, however, courtesy of Rheinmetall.
The name probably sounds familiar, and for good reason. Rheinmetall is an industrial giant from Germany, famous for its role in building the Leopard 2 tank among many other projects. The company stands as one of Europe’s largest arms manufacturers, but it’s recently been extending itself into the electric vehicle space, too.
The result of that work is the aptly-named Curb Charger. It’s literally an EV charger that sits in place of a section of concrete curb on the side of the road. Why didn’t we think of that?
Thus far, street-based charging solutions have often focused on leveraging things like bollards or existing streetlamps or utility poles. Rheinmetall’s solution is altogether cleaner and lower profile, essentially matching the profile of the street’s existing concrete curb.
The charger is capable of delivering up to 22 kW of power to an electric vehicle. It’s more intended for extended charging sessions in areas where people might park their cars for a long period of time.
While the device is intended to become part of the street infrastructure itself, it’s still been designed with an eye to maintainability. A quick-release system enables the hardware to be swapped out by technicians in the event a charger fails in the field.
The device weighs 176 pounds with its weather resistant stainless steel and aluminum housing. In a nice touch for colder climates, it’s capable of heating itself to ensure the charger isn’t made inaccessible by snow or ice. Being IP68 rated, it can withstand water to a depth of 3.2 feet for 30 minutes, so outside of severe flooding, it should have no problem holding up to the weather.
Indeed, Rheinmetall has demonstrated its safety by pouring a bucket of water over the device while it’s in the middle of charging a vehicle. Built-in drains prevent moisture from building up inside, while an internal water sensor will halt the flow of power in the event the device becomes compromised.
The Curb Charger packs in a 4G modem and ethernet port in order to handle billing and monitoring. Users can interface with the device using a smartphone app, QR codes, or by scanning an RFID tag. Users need to supply their own charging cables, as a built-in cable would compromise the low-profile installation that is the unique selling point of the device.
We see a lot of interesting products pop up in press releases that promise to solve various automotive problems. However, Rheinmetall’s charger isn’t just an idea. It’s already been deployed in the City of Cologne for well over a year. Four chargers racked up more than 2,800 successful charging cycles. Rheinmetall states that the chargers averaged over two charges per day per charging point. They proved reliable, too, with availability over 99%.
Chargers like this could really open up the EV market to the street-parking masses. There are still challenges, mostly around delivering electrical infrastructure to places where it formerly wasn’t needed. Regardless, Rheinmetall’s subtle curbside charger could prove a game-changer for cities looking to offer a realistic street-charging solution that doesn’t clutter the sidewalk.
Top graphic images: Rheinmetall
I can see this working in some gated access only, Karen & Ken run, strict rules, overly watchful & ridiculously expensive HOA..with a snowless dry climate.
Otherwise it’s as others have noted, the weather and human elements will render this a no go in most of the USA.
This overly complicated and expensive (read: German) solution is a huge step in the right direction in terms of EV adoption and infrastructure.
Level 3 fast chargers cost anywhere upwards of $100k to install. Meanwhile, level 1 chargers can be installed for a few thousand dollars.
Our cars spend a much longer time parked. How many Level 1 (slow chargers) could we install for the price of one fast charger? We should have cheap slow chargers getting installed everywhere. Much more cost effective and way more useful.
I’ve got a weird hankering for Rheinmetall as a company, and have watched countless Youtube videos about their military and industrial products. I’ve even had a t-shirt with their logo on it in my online shopping cart for months now, with only my righteous indignation at paying $35. for a t-shirt keeping me from pressing the ‘buy now’ button. Rheinmetall makes some very impressive machines, and a lot of them look good too, in that form follows function German way of decades past (thinking of the first couple generations of Mercedes Benz E-Class sedans for example).
This curb charger seems like a good idea, and I’ll have to take them at their word re: durability/weatherproofing despite the obvious worries. I gotta think some enterprising homeless guys in LA would have their way with it toot sweet, no matter how impervious Rheinmetall engineers think it is. That glass over the screen seems particularly vulnerable, but mabe it’s made of something better than gorilla glass. Perhaps I’m needlessly worrying… I’m sure they have some truly great engineers and designers there.
I still have never owned an EV 🙁 but hope to have one as a daily eventually. Given my modest driving habits, I’m sure that I’ll charge at home 98% of the time, but it’ll still be nice to have options for longer-distance trips.
Neat but silly idea. They clearly had engineers to mitigate the obvious issues but no designers to tell them nobody wants to touch anything on the ground if they can avoid it.
Eh.. The only point of contact is lifting a flap, you’d be plugging in your own cable. There’s a QR code for an app which is used to initiate the session. I mean, you may have a point with NYC curbs which may or may not have urine on it.. but you can still open the flap with a pen if you’re squeamish. Any other city beyond NY, Chicago, LA are probably fine. Are you concerned with having to bend down to the ground? Elderly/disabled may agree with you.
Yes, bending down is a drag, especially if you carry something on your shoulder, anything on your head may fall off: sunglasses, hat, etc. And you have to use both hands, not elegant, very inconvenient.
Wow. What do you do when your shoes become untied or you drop a quarter?