A recent interview in Autocar (6^th Oct 2025) with charger operator Osprey put costs associated with the grid as the bottleneck in their profitability equation. In the last three years, the standing charge alone has increased by almost two orders of magnitude now accounting for the majority of the cost of energy. With the inclusion of planning, grid connection and other non-energy operational costs profitability for such charging hubs is proving elusive.

Part of the FEVER team attended the Solar & Storage Live exhibition at Birmingham’s NEC from the 22nd to the 24th of September. This major event provided an excellent opportunity to present the progress of the FEVER research project to experts in solar and energy storage from around the world.

The FEVER project team, represented by Prof Andrew Cruden, Prof David Stone, and Dr Maria Nunez recently got back from a lively couple of days at the All Energy Exhibition and Conference 2025 in Glasgow, on 14th-15th of May 2025.

This leading event draws in renewable energy experts, enthusiasts, and innovators from all over the world, and it gave us a brilliant platform to show everyone the exciting progress we're making on all aspects of the FEVER research project.

During our Q10 FEVER consortium meeting at the Utilita Bowl, Southampton, on 26^th March 2025, members of the FEVER Industrial Advisory Board, namely Hugh Brennan (UK Managing Director, Hive Energy) and Dr Nick Head (Head of Sustainability, XPO Logistics) visited the Wide Lane containerised demonstrator and witnessed this fully off-grid system charging an electric van.

Southampton University members of the FEVER project team exhibited and promoted a fully off-grid solution to electric vehicle (EV) charging at the recent University of Southampton Science and Engineering Day (SED) on the 15^th March 2025. This was the 2^nd year running that FEVER have presented at the annual University of Southampton Science and Engineering Festival (www.sotsef.co.uk), delivered as part of the national British Science Week.

Mr Henry Green, Deputy Director of Strategy at Ofgem, visited the first FEVER containerised demonstrator system, based at the University of Southampton Wide Lane Sports Fields, on Thursday 20^th February 2025. Although the weather was not great on the day(!), Henry was impressed by the installation and operation of the first fully off-grid, containerised demonstration of the FEVER EV (electric vehicle) charging station and commented: “It was great to visit the demonstrator up close. Innovations like this have the potential to play a critical role in our future system, and it’s really impressive seeing first hand the energy and ambition of the people involved.”

The FEVER project team were delighted to be invited to exhibit their ‘demonstration’ off-grid EV charging solution at the recent Waitrose Farming Conference 2024 , on the John Lewis Partnership Leckford Estate, on Wednesday 8th May 2024.

The rapid rise in electric vehicles (EVs) in the UK for domestic and commercial use is helping to decarbonise the transport sector, as well as affording benefits to residential air quality. As a society, this is clearly a good thing, if we are to tackle the growing spectre of climate change and to help prevent life-curtailing respiratory diseases. However, if we scratch beneath the surface of this positive drive towards electrification, there are hidden depths that should be considered; including the extent to which access to the benefits of electrification are fair.