Powerland in EV City: case study City of Ghent
Powerland was featured by EV City in a case study about the collaboration with the City of Ghent. In the article, the City of Ghent explains how it is further optimizing its charging infrastructure and organizing it for the future.
Today, that challenge goes far beyond installing additional charging points. For cities, municipalities, and organizations with a growing electric fleet, charging infrastructure is increasingly becoming a strategic whole of power, monitoring, management, smart control, service, and scalability.
The case study shows how the City of Ghent, together with Powerland, is working on a charging ecosystem that not only functions today but is also ready for the further electrification of the fleet.
Read the full case study in EV City.
From charging points to a manageable charging ecosystem
The first charging infrastructure within the internal fleet of the City of Ghent dates back more than 15 years. What started with simple charging solutions evolved step by step into smart charging stations, local grids, and systems that can better control energy flows. Today, urban charging infrastructure is in a new phase. The focus is no longer solely on expansion, but mainly on optimization. Charging points must remain reliable, be traceable online, be managed correctly, and handle available power intelligently.
For the City of Ghent, this means that charging infrastructure is viewed as part of a broader mobility and energy policy. The city wants to further electrify its internal fleet, but at the same time avoid putting pressure on the operation of city services. Therefore, an integrated approach is needed: charging points, management platforms, EMS, smart grids, service, and future planning must be aligned.
Why urban charging infrastructure is becoming more complex
For a city, charging infrastructure is rarely a simple sum of charging points. The City of Ghent works with various sites, administrative and logistics centers, pool cars, light commercial vehicles, operational services, and trucks. Each type of use has its own charging needs. Pool cars, for example, need to be maximally charged and available for internal car sharing. Light commercial vehicles of operational services require fixed charging locations or hubs. For trucks, higher power and thoughtful placement play an important role. Above that, consideration must be given to existing infrastructure, older charging points, available grid capacity, safety, regulations, and future growth.
That is where the real challenge arises: charging infrastructure must not only be installed but also remain manageable.
Smart use of available power
An important theme in the case study is the available electrical power. As more vehicles become electric, the energy demand at the various city sites also increases. The City of Ghent therefore makes forecasts per site, paying attention to the number of vehicles, the planned electrification, and the future electricity demand. These analyses show that the electricity demand of the entire fleet towards 2031 will increase significantly. At some sites, this even involves a strong increase up to a doubling of demand.
Therefore, new charging infrastructure is made as future-proof as possible. Think of sufficient margin in low-voltage panels, conduits, and charging infrastructure, but also the right time to implement EMS systems or consider a possible upgrade of the electrical installation.
For cities and municipalities, this is a crucial insight: electric charging cannot be seen separately from buildings, energy consumption, grid capacity, and future growth.
The role of EMS, monitoring, and smart control
An Energy Management System helps to distribute available power more intelligently. This way, power not needed for buildings can be automatically used for charging points. This enables further electrification without the need for immediate heavy power upgrades on every site.
Monitoring also plays an increasingly important role. Some of the older charging points of the City of Ghent could not yet be traced online. New systems make it possible to better monitor charging points, detect errors faster, and manage usage more efficiently. This data is important for various decisions. They help, among other things, to further optimize TCO models of vehicles, detect anomalies or outliers, and better support operational services. Charging infrastructure thus becomes not a separate technical element, but a manageable system that can be continuously monitored and adjusted.
Why the City of Ghent chose Powerland
Powerland was selected by the City of Ghent through a public European tender. Powerland came out best in the evaluation in terms of price-quality. In practice, the collaboration also proved valuable at the operational level. The City of Ghent refers in the case study to the professional and correct approach of Powerland, the monitoring of charging stations, charging sessions, and charging passes, and the improvement of downtime after adjusting flows and SLAs.
Keeping older charging infrastructure operational is also important. Powerland has the right contacts, parts, and technicians to keep existing charging points working as long as possible, both in terms of hardware and software. For the City of Ghent, the proactive monitoring behind the scenes is a particular added value. Powerland monitors charging points and problems, without the city having to take action itself each time. Only for major problems or defects is a solution discussed together.
Impact on users and shared charging points
Although the City of Ghent provides its charging infrastructure primarily for its own city services, some shared fast charging points have also had a broader impact. At the time of implementation, there were few public fast charging options available in Ghent. By making certain fast chargers semi-publicly accessible, the city was able to support the electrification of taxis and early adopters. Today, Powerland keeps these charging points operational and ensures correct settlement behind the scenes.
This shows how charging infrastructure for cities and municipalities sometimes fulfills multiple functions simultaneously: internal use, operational reliability, public accessibility, and support for the broader mobility transition.
What other cities and municipalities can learn from this
The case of the City of Ghent clearly shows that charging infrastructure for local authorities is becoming a strategic issue. It is no longer just about the question of how many charging points are needed. At least as important are the questions behind the scenes:
- How much power is available per site?
- Which vehicles need to charge when?
- Which charging points are critical for operation?
- How are charging points monitored and managed?
- When is EMS needed?
- How is downtime limited?
- How does the infrastructure remain compliant, safe, and future-proof?
For cities, municipalities, and public organizations that want to further electrify their fleet, that is the core of the challenge. A reliable charging ecosystem requires a partner who looks beyond installation alone. Monitoring, management, service, smart control, and scalability are becoming increasingly important.
Powerland as a partner for future-oriented charging infrastructure
Powerland supports cities, municipalities, businesses, and organizations in the development, management, and optimization of charging infrastructure.
That means: charging solutions that not only work today but are also prepared for tomorrow. With attention to available power, smart control, monitoring, service, uptime, and growth. Because the future of electric driving is not only determined by the number of charging points. But mainly by how reliably, manageably, and smartly those charging points are deployed.
This article is based on the case study that appeared in EV City. Read the case study in EV City
Do you want to develop your charging infrastructure for the future?
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