Four-Year EU Project EV4EU Wraps Up With Working Bidirectional Charging Hardware and Open Software

A European research consortium has closed the books on EV4EU, a four-year effort to make vehicle-to-grid technology practical for everyday charging networks. The group announced that it has completed its work, leaving behind a functioning bidirectional CCS charging prototype alongside open-source software intended for charging point operators.

At the heart of the project was the idea that an electric car should not be treated solely as a load on the grid. Instead, the partners wanted to demonstrate that plugged-in vehicles can help the power system absorb fluctuations and balance supply and demand. To that end, the team built and tested hardware capable of both drawing energy and pushing it back through the same CCS connection, a capability that most current public chargers cannot offer.

The software side of the project was aimed squarely at the businesses and operators who run charging infrastructure. By releasing tools as open source, the consortium hopes to lower the barrier for operators who want to add bidirectional functions to their networks without building everything from scratch. The group also used the project to look at how EV charging interacts with the wider electricity system.

Four demonstration sites put the concept into practice, showing a range of ways that electric cars can contribute to grid flexibility. According to the project partners, these trials illustrate how vehicles can support the adaptability of the power system rather than simply consuming from it. The exact locations and technical results of each demonstration were not detailed in the announcement.

EV4EU’s completion comes as grid operators and automakers across Europe continue to debate how quickly bidirectional charging – often labelled V2G or V2X – can move from pilot projects to commercial services. While the technology has been proven in trials, questions remain about standards, compensation for vehicle owners and the availability of compatible cars and chargers. The project’s outputs add another building block for operators preparing for a future in which parked EVs double as distributed energy storage.