BTC Power, one of the largest DC fast charger manufacturers in the United States, announced today the integration of Tesla's North American Charging Standard (NACS) connector into its products over the next year.
The NACS charging connector will be available in 2024, alongside the already-used Combined Charging System (CCS1) and CHAdeMO plugs.
The news was initially exclusively reported by Reuters, but later the company issued a press release, explaining that the development of the NACS-compatible unit started in advance.
"It was critical that this innovation was taken seriously by BTC POWER, and proper research and communications were done before making the decision. By adding the market leading uptime of Gen 4 with multiple connector types including CCS and NACS, BTC POWER can now offer the best customer experience to all EV makes and models."
The press release includes a photo of the BTC Power Gen4 DC fast charger already equipped with the NACS plug and holder. Clearly, it is some kind of prototype used for tests.
The BTC Power Gen4 DC fast charger has a power output of up to 180 kilowatts (kW) and two plugs to charge two vehicles simultaneously.
Frank Meza, CEO of BTC Power noted thanks to the integration of NACS (alongside CCS1), the EV industry will be able to eliminate the need for unreliable and unpredictable adaptors:
“As one of the first and oldest charger manufacturers in the US, it has been critical to lead market innovations that include the first CCS1 charger in North America, charger rates up to 360kW continuous, 500A CTEP Certification, and now the NACS connector. By including the NACS connector to our chargers we can eliminate the need for unreliable & unpredictable adaptors that are being utilized by drivers using our equipment.”
Let's recall that within the last several weeks, automakers are joining Tesla's NACS coalition one by one - including Ford, General Motors, and Rivian, earlier today. There is also Aptera, which does not produce BEVs yet but was supporting the transition from the beginning.
BTC Power says that so far it sold more than 22,000 charging systems of various types to various charging networks - including the largest ones. According to Reuters' article, more than half of that number falls on "high-speed ones," so we assume DC fast chargers.
