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Portugal: i-charging presents Blueberry charging stations – 600kW

Being modular by nature, Blueberry clusters are to allow simultaneous charging with up to 600kW.

The new company i-charging from Portugal launched its mighty range of Blueberry charging stations at a virtual press event last night. The Porto-based vendor claims the chargers are designed to deliver 50kW to up to 600 kW through modular set-ups.

 

Following the event, we had reached out with a request for comment and further detail on i-charging’s claim to reach 600 kW with the 500 A and 1000 Volt charging station. One explanation we had come up with was that perhaps the 600 kW come from two charge points at 300 kW each.

 

The CEO Pedro Moreira da Silva confirmed this shortly after. “A system has a certain power, while each output has a certain maximum current. So, a 600 kW system with at least 2 outputs can deliver for example 300+300 kW, or 350+250 kW, and so on. If an EV comes to the market that can use 500kW the system is already available for that and still leave 100kW available for another plug.”.

 

This, the Blueberry chargers can indeed deliver as the columns, that come in pure black, can support set-ups of up to four charge points each, in any combination of CCS and ChaDeMo, or just CCS for example. This multi-standard nature also transfers into the modular selection.

 

Blueberry will come in three possible configurations: blueberry, blueberry Plus and blueberry Cluster. “This solution allows charging all vehicles currently in circulation, as well as those that will be launched by brands in the future with batteries up to 1000 V,” i-charging explained.

 

The standard Blueberry features 50 kW charge power with two outputs. Going up to Blueberry Plus, i-charging envisions set-ups for 100 – 600 kW, backed up by separate power banks. From 100 to 150 kW one module is added, from 200 to 350 kW a second and over 400 kW a third module. These stationery backup batteries are also instrumental for the cluster option, which i-charging says they designed with fleet operators in mind.

 

Here, sequential and simultaneous charging is crucial and da Silva already claimed at the event that their solution could support an “unlimited number of outputs” though scalability on site.

 

When writing to us, he later added that another limitation was the charging cable and the standard, especially when it comes to ChaDeMo. “There are 200A plugs available in the market, and the standard goes up to 500V so that 100kW can be used,” he explained.

 

 

 

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