OSMUS State of Charge - June 8, 2025

Communities United States
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:zap:

State of Charge - June 8th, 2025

For the week of June 1st to June 7th the Alternative Fuel Data Center has posted 42 new charging stations in the United States! All of which have been uploaded to OSM. To subscribe to these changes in OSM and to see an archive of .csv and .geojson files please add the RSS feed to your favorite reader. All links and files are also centrally located on the OSM Wiki as the United States AFDC Manual Sync Project.

:open_book:

Insights from this week

  • During the conflation step with existing OSM data, there was one item(s) to conflate, which was a station I had imported mid-week during some unrelated additions. A neat new station is the bp pulse gigahub in California, featuring 8 NACS and 4 CCS connectors to those near San Francisco airport. I have included a rendering of a gigahub as the station is not on more commerical applications like PlugShare yet to share photos:

image courtesy of bp pulse
image courtesy of bp pulse1240×827 93.7 KB

  • Compared to last week’s addition of 24 station, this week’s addition of 42 is a welcome uptick (Memorial Day likely slowed progress last week).
  • I have yet to confirm anywhere else (but please feel free to survey!) but it seems some ChargePoint stations have started putting native NACS connectors in their new stations. This is a welcome addition as previously only Tesla and Alpitronic dispensers had native NACS in the US. As this is now the new standard (even bearing our continent name - North America Charging Standard) I suspect these will start to show quite the uptick as older CHAdeMO ports are replaced with NACS and CCS.

:battery:

New in the Charging Station OSM world

Progress on the EV station cleanup has slowed as my attention has focused more to imports than cleanup. So far the following states have been updated:

  • Georgia
  • South Carolina
  • Florida

The site / database supercharege.info has agreed to let OSM users use their data and I am coordinating an import of their data on their discourse: link to the discussion. If all goes well we would be getting much more up-to-date information on Tesla superchargers in the US and they would benefit from OSM data as well on their site. To facilitate this, I have “Any Tag You Like” created ref:supercharge_info=* to have a common field between our databases. It is still early days but I will be updating the Supercharge.info_Import page on my Codeberg with any files / scripts I use. So far I did a test import of the state of Georgia and seemed to go well. Both I and “Rovastar” on the Supercharge.info side have gone through it and are discussing ways to make the larger import better. I will be creating some OSM wiki pages this week on discussions, proposed imports, etc. to be OSM-compliant.

I am hopeful this goes smoothly and we can reach out to a few more sources to do the same on a non-Tesla import. Specifically, I have been reading through the discussions with OpenChargeMap (we use ref:ocm=* already in OSM to link the database) and will hopefully reach out to see if their CC 4.0 license can be imported into OSM or what parts can. They are essentially the OSS equivalent of PlugShare in the US so it is much more crowd-sourced data which is sometimes great but I imagine will require a bit more of a fine tooth comb to go through.

:tada:

A Special Thanks

A very special thanks is in order to @Rovastar from Supercharge.info this week for their willingness to have OSM use their data!

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I’m here too. Just don’t post much on OSM boards nowadays.

Edit: 2007 I joined that makes me feel old now…

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Updated the “special thanks” section to tag you! Thanks!

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I was 10 when you joined if that saids anything! OSM has been around for as long as I’ve been able to use a computer, but I only just found it December 2024

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That makes it worse! You kid. :smile:

I must say you have peaked my interest in doing charging stations in OSM.

I gave up a few years ago because the standard/agreement was so bad but the wiki and general consensus has improved a lot now and I think the sockets for tesla stuff is fixable.

I’m looking to do an overhaul of the Name Suggestion Index stuff to get that up to speed and I’ll chip on the wiki to get things improved.

Regarding these AFDB changes in general. It would be nice if you could match up some of the data with the NSI. Rivian Adventure Network, etc.
I know some aren’t there yet. BP pulse is an obvious omission in the US,

It can be tricky with operator and brand tags too for the EVGO ones that partner with pilot/flying J so not sure what the brand /operator is there and I’m not sure at all what you should do with Chargepoint as they are often branded differently. EA also cobrands a lot.

This is most an American issue as Europe doesn’t have many like this and I can’t think of many case in the rest of the world but the US started the blurring of the lines of true CPOs with I’ll call them “charging networks”. Tesla are doing this too with their selling superchargers to others and they can brand them but be a charging network and with Tesla as the traditional CPO. I think this trend will continue worldwide.

It would easier to just go with what the AFDB but I’m not sure that would be correct - although struggling to concrete formula for optimum solutions. I would be interested in your thoughts, Obviously imports are good and that is your goal here but I want a robust framework for what we should call all of these in the future for the whole of OSM.

Also you use the name tag as the same as the brand/operator. That goes against the wiki (which is questionable as it the signpost.) but maybe the wiki needs changing.

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And for US-WA: I added a recently-opened new station here and removed one that no longer exists here.

For that first one, I would appreciate your review and fixup, since this is a topic I don’t know much about!

There’s Mapillary imagery that I took, if that’s helpful: linky

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@Lumikeiju - That looks great! Only thing I would add (and it’s completely up to you and the level of detail you want) is the man_made=charge_point nodes. These are the physical dispensers, and in Tesla’s case 1 dispenser = 1 capacity. According to supercharge.info, these do not have magic docks but is a Tesla partner site so it would be:

man_made=charge_point
brand=Tesla
brand:wikidata=Q478214
socket:nacs=1
socket:nacs:output=350
capacity=1
access=yes

Same with the overall station if you wanted to add:

socket:nacs=12
access=yes
capacity=12

Thanks for finding it! It may take me some time to work my way over to the west coast with my AFDC imports and such.

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Thanks for the info! It’s not something I’m personally interested in mapping at that level of detail, but I really appreciate the details and the work you’re doing!

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Mission accomplished!

Perhaps @bhousel may be good to coordinate with that on. He is involved (maintainer?) of the NSI, as well as a Tesla owner himself so we’ve had these discussions too. I tried to add IONNA but got pushback because it is too new, so I’ve placed my efforts elsewhere, but I’m sure the NSI folks would welcome a pull request!

long drag on cigarette… you’ve stumbled upon one of my imperfections! As this is a manual process right now (mainly done in LibreCalc after a minor python script to filter the total database) It’s mostly a “what Kevin has heard them called before.” Since I have only done this for a few weeks now, you’ll find week to week is slightly different as I settle into a workflow. Some networks I do shorten, for instance AFDC has ChargePoint as CHARGEPOINT NETWORK. I find the former to be more widely used and OSM-compatible so I change it. Certainly up for suggestions on standardization on that. Might be worth a wiki page to show conversions of more than column names for things like that (and wikidata vlaues so I don’t need to search to page 3 of wikidata each week to find the Q number of FLO).

I love this particular challenge. It is technically GM Energy, at a Pilot/Flying J, part of the EVgo Xtended network. Who is the CPO? I don’t know. I know that I put brand=GM Energy and network=EVgo. Is PFJ an operator? That’s a lot to ask a casual mapper to contemplate. Especially if it is GM now that they are pretty heavy into IONNA while still propping up GM Energy stations.

Sometimes they are the brand but many times they are wrapped and are the operator (like utility stations near me). Sometimes they are just one of many networks at a station (IONNA can be paid for via ChargePoint app)(Mercedes-Benz uses ChargePoint branding on their stations - at least they did, I havent checked one of their new Alpitronic stations), and sometimes they are just the manufacturer of a charge point.

It’s a bit difficult because EV infrastructure typically uses “Charge Point Operator” (CPO) to refer to the operator of a station, that often times includes connecting to their network and using their charge management systems. But to a user of EV chargers, they typically care about brand (so they can filter based on that), network (so they can make sure they can pay how they like), socket so they can make sure they are physically able to charge.

Stations rarely have a name. And when they do, it’s much more of a “type” or “model” of station (unfortunately doen’t fit the OSM model definition) such as Tesla Supercharge vs Destination Charger or IONNA’s Rechargery, Rechargery Relay, and Rechargery Beacons.

I’m all for wiki changes, and would actually think it is easier to create a “United States Charging Station” guide / page where we put all this when we compile it. We could then link to that page from the main amenity=charging_station and man_made=charge_point pages.

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NSI

Yeah chatting now to @bhousel now. Operator or brand? charging_stations · Issue #11030 · osmlab/name-suggestion-index · GitHub
Tbh i agree for rejecting Ionna atm as they only have a handful. They want 30 or more and they should be there in no time.

Charging station tags

Yeah I get that it is the early stages and things will change with the import. Just throw out question here.

I completely forgot about network.

I’m not even sure experts in the EV charging space can accurately define CPO, EMSP, CSMS and a host of other terms that might be different in different parts of the world. It is crazy complex, nuanced and fluid especially if you consider the entire world.
Let alone try and fit these into OSM and convince the world to agree to them all. I relish and fear the challenge though.

CPOs mostly I think best described for most of the world as the entity that maintains chargers and deals with government regulations (I’m not sure what regulation the US has for CPOs but submitting to the AFDB is like a regulation) and for that. The OCPP/OCPI protocols /standard and how they are entered there as it is Europe and US now and become the western standard and hopefully more global (expect China (I know far to much about China’s CPOs than anyone in the west who has never been to China should know)
Anyway I would go with what they say as the operator.
So for that pikot/Flying J is EVgo’ i expect the same as the alt fuel DB.

I use ChargeFinder - Charging stations for electric cars (EV)
There might be a master list somewhere but I find that does the job.

This seems the most consensus on what is an operator. We need to pick something and (I’m from the UK not the US) ideally something the works most places in the world. What the roaming app would call the locations. I get roaming apps aren’t really a thing in the US …yet.

The brand can be how it is rebadged.

I have no idea yet about the network tab.
What do consider this to be?

I forgot about the Ionna Rechargery, beacon, etc
Or the BP pulse gigahubs, etc I’m not sure we should go down the route of all these sub names.but worth thing about.

I think General I’m happy with the name of the brand/operator

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Out and about right now so I’ll respond more later but wanted to share a Overpass Ultra map of EV stations you may find cool:

Query:

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GA-Kevin-Codes/EV-Charging-Map/refs/heads/main/EV-Charging-Map-Query.ultra

Also, since you’re in the UK it would be good to include Rob (@RobJN) since he’s done a lot in the UK and OSM in general around EV infrastructure (including his proposal to fix the Tesla sockets)

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Nice map.

Good to know someone else has an interest in fixing the charging stations and the horrible Tesla sockets…tbh I was going to just mass edit that change when the imports are sorted and go toe to toe with working groups.

I think I meet @RobJN many (6?) years ago if I have the right person who ran the Birmingham meetup I went to few of those and had a (Christmas?) OSM Balti too.

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Yes that’s me, and sounds like it was our Christmas outing.

I found myself interested in EV charging data when the UK Public Charge Point Regulations came out and resulted in consistent open data from CPOs. I have been collecting and collating this for OSM but not yet done much in way of big bulk imports yet as I was (1) working on tagging improvements in the wiki and (2) doing a slow manual merge of Gridserve data as a pilot.

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Yeah it was 6 maybe 7 or 8 years ago. I came over from Derby for a change to the East Mids meets. Did a bunch of your meetings at the Bull too.

Yeah found that wiki now. I’ll chip in with more UK stuff there.

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Reading this I don’t see a problem using openchargemap data they seem to have a fair bit now. What issues do you have with it not being allowed?

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Mainly because OpenChargeMap has a few different licenses (now and over the years) depending on which part we are talking about (imports, feeds, user comments / contributions, etc.) The main license is CC BY 4.0 to my understanding which according to the OSMF is not automatically compatible with OSM’s ODbL.

Additionally, it seems previous attempts were kind-of half-hearted in their effort and the maintainer understandably did not want to dedicate time to making another service better by giving their data away even if they are okay with OSM using the data ourselves. Our next attempt to reach out should probably show we are organized and serious about our ability to do the heavy lifting if they are willing to share the data. Much like I did with supercharge.info with the Georgia import to show what we are using, how we are using it, and a way to make both databases better.

Finally, as much as I would love to dive into this head first, the AFDC and Supercharge.info + my cleanup projects are taking up a good amount of my OSM time these days, to add OCM import to my list right now may slow further the other projects. Happy to help if anyone else wants to be the lead on this one, but right now I can’t one-man-band it.

State of the Map US is next week in Boston, maybe I can convince a few of my fellow Americans to get into these projects :slight_smile:

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Side note: @Rovastar I saw you added a new wiki page for your thoughts – that’s a great effort! Can I add a section for “Approved Data Import Sources”? May be good to start collecting them centrally now that we have a handful approved or in-progress.

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oh that is really just a basic draft and is very messy atm. I just wanted to brain dump something down. Not ‘advertised’ it yet.

Feel free to edit it, ideally I want the few EV charging enthusiasts out there to chip in and it be a hub for things to do and what people are doing.

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Thanks – I’ll work on something tonight after work!

Side note, I finally bought myself a real computer (so far have been using a Raspberry Pi for all this). Should be here next week, I am hoping that will make it faster and easier to contribute to various projects!