As part of an ambitious strategy, FM Logistic is firmly committed to electric mobility. The aim? To install a Charging Infrastructure for Electric Vehicles (IRVE) that not only meets current needs, but is also capable of adapting to ever greater electrification in the future.
By choosing the Eiko power cube at its French headquarters, FM Logistic has been able to set up a scalable recharging solution for its employees to charge their vehicles at work.
Read what Edwin Proust, Environment and Energy Project Manager at FM Logistic, has to say.
FM Logistic, a major player in the logistics sector, is moving from one to 13 charging points, without any work, to recharge its fleet and its employees.
My main tasks involve rolling out FM Logistic’s entire energy-environment policy. This includes major decarbonisation initiatives such as the installation of photovoltaic panels, the electrification of our car parks with recharging point systems, and overall waste management.
At FM Logistic, our CSR policy is based on three pillars: People, Planet, Partners. The electrification of our car parks and the expansion of our fleet of electric vehicles are 100% in line with our commitment to the environmental dimension, represented by the Planet pillar.
We opted for Eiko because it is quick and easy to install, requiring little civil engineering.
Simplified deployment is combined with an efficient power supply, perfectly suited to low electrical power, meeting our specific needs.
Edwin Proust, Environment and Energy Project Manager at FM Logistic
What were the reasons behind the decision to electrify your site?
The Longueil-Sainte-Marie site, a logistics platform over 20 years old, covers 90,000 m², employs around 450 people and is also home to FM Logistic’s French head office.
With a large fleet of company vehicles, this site has a greater need for electrification than our other facilities.
With a view to meeting this demand for 13 places in the short term, we were looking for technical solutions that could meet our challenges.
Changes in car fleets: the challenge of recharging for businesses
With the advent of electric and rechargeable hybrid vehicles, and under the combined effect of environmental policies and regulations such as the LOM law, the deployment of recharging solutions in companies is becoming essential.
FM Logistic is deeply committed to meeting its legal obligations under the LOM law, particularly in terms of the electrification of car parks by January 2025. We are therefore in the process of deploying charging points at all our sites in order to comply with these ambitious but achievable regulations.
Whatever the business sector, the electrification of company car parks represents a major challenge. Needs are growing and accelerating, both for recharging fleets and for employee vehicles.
And while companies need to incorporate this new service into their long-term property development plans now, it is when it comes to upgrading existing buildings that the projects are most complex. This situation is perfectly illustrated by FM Logistic’s experience at its Longueil-Sainte-Marie site, where the company needed to upgrade its range of chargepoints.
Before the Mob-Energy project, we only had one equipped parking space, which was becoming restrictive.
Around six cars had to recharge, creating an inconvenient rotation for users of this single charging point.
Our plan was to increase the number of charge points to 13.
Simplified installation of the IRVE: no civil engineering work, no power increase
During this project, we were faced with two major challenges. The first concerned the power supply, as our network offered limited power in our car park, necessitating costly and complex infrastructure modifications. The second constraint related to our asphalt mix: we needed a non-intrusive system to avoid major roadworks, while preserving its integrity.
Installing charging points in company car parks to recharge employees is a crucial project for many companies, such as FM Logistic. At the heart of these deployment projects lies a central obstacle: the availability of the necessary power. As our customer has experienced, existing buildings and car parks generally lack the electrical infrastructure required to power a large number of charging points. This means that costly work and long lead times are required to obtain the extra power.
However, solutions exist to optimise these installations and enable several charge points to be installed, considerably limiting the power demand on the network.
The system we have put in place is quite simple.
We disconnected the previous terminal, a system with an 11 kW connection, and connected this cable directly to the new Eiko system.
Thanks to its 40 kWh battery, it can now power 13 seats instead of just one, while maintaining the same power supply for the whole system.”
The plan to increase the number of charge points by a factor of 13 while maintaining the same connection power may seem surprising. But the Eiko power cube stands out for the intelligence of its operation, combining the power of the grid and the energy stored in its batteries. In the case of FM Logistic, a single 11 kW connection can deliver up to 45 kW to the 13 interconnected charge points.
The other major advantage of the Mob-Energy solution is that all the electrical cabling is installed above ground, so the solution can be set up without any additional civil engineering work.
Another of Eiko’s distinctive features is the interconnection of its bollards, forming an independent network, and their above-ground installation. Unlike conventional installations, where each bollard is connected to the electricity grid, this method avoids the need for earthworks and the laying of long electrical cables. As well as significantly reducing financial costs, this innovation is also part of a sobriety approach, since it requires fewer materials, such as copper.
Optimised daily recharging for employees
Today, we are mainly working with plug-in hybrids. Most vehicles arrive at the platform empty and are recharged for around ten kWh. A simple recharge, over the whole day or the whole morning, can be done without a hitch using the Eiko cube.
Like FM Logistic, many companies considering the installation of recharging solutions for their employees need to consider their real needs. And when employees are parked for several hours at a time, opting for powerful systems isn’t really the right choice, and in any case isn’t really optimised. In fact, as observed by our customer, employees are mainly looking for a daily recharge of a few kWh, sufficient to cover their home-to-work journeys of around 30 to 50 km.
Given that their vehicles are parked for between 4 and 8 hours, a low-power charge is more than enough to meet their needs and achieve the desired charge level. And to meet urgent needs, Eiko is able to prioritise sessions with its advanced order-taking and scheduling system. Depending on the amount of energy required and the expected parking time, Eiko intelligently allocates power, giving priority to those vehicles that will be leaving the soonest.
Our users are very satisfied with Mob-Energy’s solution, which has enabled us to recharge 3,000 kWh or around 15,000 km of range in our vehicles in just two and a half months.
Monetise recharging with employees and other users
The issue of monetising the recharging service is a recurring concern when it comes to setting up recharging solutions in the workplace. For businesses, this raises a number of considerations, particularly in terms of the administration and management of access to the service, the payment methods offered and the flow of information.
At the Longueil-Sainte-Marie site, there was also a need to recharge our employees’ private electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles. Mob-energy’s Eiko solution enabled us to offer monetisation for different needs, whether for our partners or our employees.
With Eiko, FM Logistic can monetise the service by offering customised access for each type of user:
- The user of a company vehicle, who will have free access to the service and whose consumption data will be transmitted and charged internally.
- Employees recharging their private vehicles, who will be able to take advantage of the service once they have accepted the tariff conditions.
- External visitors to the site, who can take advantage of their time on site to top up their charges, payable by bank card or mobility badge.
This approach offers great flexibility in managing the monetisation of the business recharging service, meeting the criteria defined automatically.
EIKO: a cost-effective, efficient and easy-to-install solution
Given the constraints of the Longeuil-Sainte-Marie site, using a traditional recharging system would have cost us much more than the Mob-Energy solution.
We opted for the Eiko solution for three reasons: it’s quick and easy to install, it requires very little power and it doesn’t require any major civil engineering work.
Your customized project
Every parking lot is different.
Every customer has his or her own needs.
That’s why our solutions are modular and scalable, so that your recharging infrastructure is perfectly suited to your needs at all times.