Powering the Future: A Q&A with ChargeScape on Washington’s First V2H Milestone

Puget Sound Energy (PSE) and ChargeScape have reached a significant milestone in the Pacific Northwest with the launch of Washington’s first vehicle-to-home (V2H) demonstration. This innovative project, supported by partners Ford, Kia, and Wallbox, explores the transformative potential of turning electric vehicles into residential backup power sources. By leveraging bidirectional charging, the program aims to strengthen grid reliability while offering customers a way to maintain power during outages and reduce energy costs during peak demand.

To delve into the technical integration, the role of automaker-backed software, and the roadmap toward a full-scale 2027 rollout, EV Charging Magazine recently engaged in a Q&A interview with Joseph Vellone, CEO of ChargeScape. Vellone offers valuable insights into the “connective tissue” required for grid-to-vehicle communication, the critical importance of battery health, and the future of clean energy infrastructure in North America.

EV Charging Magazine: This PSE demonstration successfully integrates both the Ford F-150 Lightning and the Kia EV9. How does the ChargeScape platform act as the “connective tissue” to ensure these different vehicle architectures can communicate seamlessly with a single utility grid?

Joseph Vellone: As the connective tissue between automakers and power utilities, ChargeScape’s role is to provide the utility with a single, standardized interface into a very diverse EV ecosystem. Each automaker has its own vehicle logic, data structures, and control pathways, but utilities simply can’t integrate to each OEM platform. Using protocols such as OpenADR and IEEE 2030.5, ChargeScape translates grid requirements into normalized charging signals and standardizes the telemetry data we receive back from the vehicle. This is what allows a utility like PSE to work with multiple manufacturers to deliver a single, coherent service to customers and the grid.

EV Charging Magazine: You are working with Wallbox (specifically the Quasar 2) for this project. What technical criteria does ChargeScape prioritize when selecting hardware partners to ensure bidirectional energy flow is both safe and efficient for the homeowner?

Joseph Vellone: When we evaluate hardware partners, safety and standards compliance come first. So we prioritize hardware with UL certification as well as compliance with relevant IEEE and IEC safety standards for anti-islanding and grid protection. We also care a lot about customer practicality: installation pathway, compatibility with the home electrical setup, and whether the hardware can deliver real customer value in the form of backup power, energy bill savings, and grid export revenue.

EV Charging Magazine: ChargeScape has a strong history in managed charging (V1G). In this Washington demonstration, how does the complexity of managing discharge (V2H) change the software requirements compared to simply shifting charge times?

Joseph Vellone: Managed charging — V1G — is fundamentally an optimization problem. You have a window of time, a price signal or a grid event, and you’re deciding when within that window to draw power and charge the EV. Vehicle-to-home (V2H) adds a second layer of complexity because now the platform has to decide not only when to charge, but also when, how much, and under what conditions to discharge. That means we have to account for the customer’s mobility needs, the vehicle’s state of charge, the economics of the utility rate structure, the needs of the home during an outage or peak period, and the technical constraints of the hardware at the site. That is why demonstrations like the one we’re doing with PSE are so important: they generate operational data on integrations, interconnection, customer experience, and billing impacts, which are exactly the data points needed to scale up bidirectional charging.

EV Charging Magazine: With BMW, Ford, Honda, and Nissan as founding investors—and partnerships with others like Tesla and Stellantis—how does being “automaker-backed” allow ChargeScape to protect battery health and warranties during bidirectional events?

Joseph Vellone: Being automaker-backed is what makes ChargeScape truly differentiated from other platforms out there. ChargeScape’s direct integrations and partnerships with leading automakers gives us access to the same battery management systems those companies use themselves. That means we can set discharge parameters that are consistent with each OEM’s own warranty guidelines. For a typical EV driver, that’s the difference between a program they can trust with their $50,000 or $80,000 asset and one that makes them nervous.

EV Charging Magazine: PSE mentioned evolving this into a full-scale program by 2027. Based on the data you’re seeing in Washington, what are the primary regulatory or technical “bottlenecks” that need to be cleared before V2H becomes a standard feature for every EV owner in North America?

Joseph Vellone: First, interconnection: the process for certifying a bidirectional home installation — particularly getting the utility, the EVSE installer, and the local AHJ aligned on a single application — is still too slow, and needs to be streamlined before you can scale to hundreds of thousands of customers. Second, tariff design: time-of-use rates that make V2H economically meaningful for customers are not yet universal. Third, hardware costs are still too high and need to come down; but we see prices moving in the right direction and utilities like PSE stepping in with incentives to help with customer affordability. The good news is that all of those barriers are solvable, and demonstrations like the one in Washington are exactly how the industry works through them with real-world data.

EV Charging Magazine: The demonstration tests “demand response events.” How many vehicles does it realistically take to make a measurable impact on a utility’s grid stability during a peak event, and can V2H reach that “critical mass” soon?

Joseph Vellone: Most bidirectional-capable EVs have an export rate of about 10 kW, and internal data we’ve obtained from auto manufacturers indicates that there are already over 1 million bidirectional-capable EVs on the road today. This represents about 10GW of nameplate capacity, the equivalent of 10 large nuclear reactors. The challenge isn’t with hardware availability; it’s getting those batteries connected to and integrated with the power grid.

EV Charging Magazine: You’ve mentioned that ChargeScape allows customers to manage everything through their existing automaker app. How important is this “familiar interface” to ensuring high participation rates in utility grid programs?

Joseph Vellone: It’s fundamental that the EV driver manage their charging through the same app they use every day to open their vehicle’s doors, preheat their cabin, etc. That’s why ChargeScape operates exclusively through automakers’ apps and interfaces to leverage preexisting customer trust and convenience.

The Future of the V2X Ecosystem

This insightful Q&A with Joseph Vellone of ChargeScape underscores the pivotal role of software orchestration in the next generation of electric vehicle charging. By bridging the gap between OEM hardware and utility grid requirements, ChargeScape is not only enabling home resilience but also unlocking a massive, untapped reservoir of distributed energy storage. As regional trials in Washington provide the necessary data for interconnection and billing, the path toward a 2027 full-scale rollout represents a major victory for both EV owners and grid operators.