Which EVSE reference does this charging point have?

[guerda]

General

Affected tag(s) to be modified/added: ref:EU:EVSE Question asked: Which EVSE reference does this charging point have?

Checklist

Checklist for quest suggestions (see guidelines):

• [x] 🚧 To be added tag is established and has a useful purpose
• [x] 🤔 Any answer the user can give must have an equivalent tagging (Quest should not reappear to other users when solved by one)
• [x] 🐿️ Easily answerable by any pedestrian from the outside but a survey is necessary
• [x] 💤 Not an overwhelming percentage of quests have the same answer (No spam)
• [x] 🕓 Applies to a reasonable number of map data (Worth the effort): 5,286 nodes in Germany, 904 of them have an EVSE filled (at the time of creation of this issue)

Ideas for implementation

Element selection: man_made=charge_point without a ref:EU:EVSE in the EU.

Metadata needed: no metadata needed per country.

Proposed UI: Text input for the EVSE. The text should explain, how the EVSE look like, e.g. DE*GCE*EACCC00161571. The first part is a country code, the second part is a operator ID and then the point ID.

[matkoniecz]

has anything changed since #5163 ?

[mcliquid]

See also: https://github.com/Helium314/SCEE/issues/444

[matkoniecz]

In other words: how one would collect this info based on survey?

See https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/issues/5163#issuecomment-1666498975 https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/issues/5163#issuecomment-1668944957

[guerda]

Sorry for not finding the duplicates, I'm happy to close this in favor of the others.

[guerda]

How to survey them: each charging point (not station) has the ID listed, in most cases above the socket or on the lid.

One important aspect did change since 13.4.2024: The EU requires all charging stations to be usable via ad hoc charging (AFIR regulation). The EVSE is used for that, as this is the identifier, all partners can be charged against. So there has to be the id clearly signed.

@matkoniecz What do you suggest, shoudl we continue this in the longer thread #5163 or here?

[mnalis]

One important aspect did change since 13.4.2024: The EU requires all charging stations to be usable via ad hoc charging (AFIR regulation).

Thanks for that updated information @guerda ! If it must be published on the EV charging station now, than it indeed sounds to me it is more eligible to become StreetComplete (or at least SCEE) Quest than it was before.

Looking at linked https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg_impl/2025/655/oj, if I understand it correctly, it would seem operators would also be required to publish their charging information in DATEX II format available to the public?

If that is indeed the requirement[^1] and license of that data is compatible with ODbL, then OSM import might perhaps make more sense (and have much bigger reach), given StreetComplete guideline:

💵 Valuable Surveyors: Surveyor time is valuable, they shouldn't be asked to complete data that does not require a survey and can more efficiently be done remotely.

Does anyone have information about that?

[^1]: and not merely a suggestion (I haven't looked deeply into it)

[guerda]

Thanks for looking into the directive even! I haven't seen any details about the publication of the charging information so I really don't know if this would contain the EVSE and if we could even map it into the OSM data structure.

I checked out the BNetzA publication of charging stations, but that format is really coarse and not really up to date (they only capture stations, not the charging points systemically).

[westnordost]

For on-foot survey: How is the EVSE id recognizable as an EVSE id? I expect there are a couple of numbers on charging stations, such as maybe a provider-local reference number, some numbers that are technical details etc.

[FloEdelmann]

The EVSE ID follows a specific format (see last paragraph in the issue description). Only one number on the charging station should match that format.

[westnordost]

Okay, so the answering instruction would be "the code that starts with DE*" (for Germany). Pretty long, this code, though...

[FloEdelmann]

They can also be much shorter: DE*EBR*S0025 (https://osm.org/node/13147489088)

[guerda]

Thank you for considering this!

Okay, so the answering instruction would be "the code that starts with DE*" (for Germany).

I would also add the hint that the ID is usually to find near the socket or on the lid.

Pretty long, this code, though... Maybe it's possible to prefill the schema with the iso country code first (e.g. DE* or NL* )? This would make country speci metadata needed m

[westnordost]

(Some photos would be helpful to decide how the interface should look (and what hints to give and to confirm that the number is actually well visible).)

[guerda]

Here are some photos where the reference numbers are shown which I've taken go collect them and enter them into osm

In many cases the evse is written ok the "intercharge" QR codes, you see this in the second picture.

[westnordost]

Ah, it is one ID for every single socket, not for each charging station. That should make them easier to find, I guess.

I noticed some are separated by "*", others by " ".

El 18 de octubre de 2025 7:52:22 CEST, "Philip Gillißen" @.***> escribió:

guerda left a comment (streetcomplete/StreetComplete#6559)

Here are some photos where the reference numbers are shown which I've taken go collect them and enter them into osm

-- Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/issues/6559#issuecomment-3417838342 You are receiving this because you commented.

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[guerda]

Correct, each socket has a unique idea. At one station, they usually share a common prefix.

The separator is usually an asterisk but it's sometimes a space. The wiki recommends to use an asterisk, see https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:ref:EU:EVSE

[westnordost]

Any ideas how we could solve the issues that stem from the charging point nodes being basically at the same geo position? (How does the user know which of the several ones ge ought to inout?)

Can charging points always be mapped, as a higher level of detail, on all charging stations?

El 18 de octubre de 2025 7:52:22 CEST, "Philip Gillißen" @.***> escribió:

guerda left a comment (streetcomplete/StreetComplete#6559)

Here are some photos where the reference numbers are shown which I've taken go collect them and enter them into osm

-- Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: https://github.com/streetcomplete/StreetComplete/issues/6559#issuecomment-3417838342 You are receiving this because you commented.

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[westnordost]

Maybe like this:

[westnordost]

In case you are interested to implement this yourself, I could give you a few pointers.

[guerda]

Maybe like this:

This looks already good. Would this only work if the surrounding charging_station has a ref maintained?

Charging points.can always be mapped as a node within a charging station area. In many cases charging stations without the changing points are mapped just as a node. I usually covert them into an area and add the charging points manually.

The charging points are usually placed as in real life, problem is that they are difficult to tell apart, especially if one of the points already has an id tagged. This could be an issue.

I would love to try it out but haven't done real Android development yet.

[westnordost]

I would love to try it out but haven't done real Android development yet.

Hmm, then, to be honest, it would be too much to get into in one go, as I'd like the form to be written in the new UI framework we are migrating to, additionally (so, one more thing to learn) - Jetpack Compose.

Another text input form that has this kind of "apply suggestion text from that other field when one starts to input in another field"-logic is the (new; unreleased IIRC) BlockAndHouseNumberForm

[westnordost]

This looks already good. Would this only work if the surrounding charging_station has a ref maintained?

Well, I'd imagine that in a radius of a few meters, the algorithm looks for other charging_points and memorizes its IDs (regardless of charging_station).

[westnordost]

I've checked the situation in Hamburg. The charging stations all don't have a EVSE signed. What they do have a note that for using it, one should scan the QR code. The QR code leads to some website on which one can select which (of the two) sockets one wants to use. And there, those sockets are actually referred to by their EVSE id.

That... kind of makes sense, that an EVSE id is not (always) printed on the charging station itself. After all, noone will painstakingly want to type the EVSE id into his car-charging-app. And since (to my knowledge) the standardization hasn't reached a level yet where one could just use one's favourite car-charging-app everywhere (in the EU), it makes sense that the QR code leads to the payment-website.

For us, however, it means that at least a hint should be added how the EVSE id could be found when there is nothing visible at the charging station or point (something along the lines of "Sometimes the EVSE id is not directly signed but one has to scan the QR code to see it"). Also, requiring to scan a QR code and go on a website is already too much to ask of a casual surveyor, so I fear the quest at least needs to be disabled by default.

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Furthermore, is it possible to map the EVSE ids of a amenity=charging_station, too? Not just for charging points? All charging stations on OSM I've seen don't have its charging points mapped separately. After all, most charging stations are just small pillars the size of a parking ticket vending machine.

[riQQ]

Furthermore, is it possible to map the EVSE ids of a amenity=charging_station, too? Not just for charging points? All charging stations on OSM I've seen don't have its charging points mapped separately. After all, most charging stations are just small pillars the size of a parking ticket vending machine.

Yes, as of now ~9% of all charging station objects have the ref:EU:EVSE set. See https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/tags/amenity=charging_station#combinations

And it's also documented on the wiki: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:amenity%3Dcharging_station#Tags

[mnalis]

Furthermore, is it possible to map the EVSE ids of a amenity=charging_station, too? Not just for charging points?

Yes, although if that charging station have more than one charging point (which is most common situation by far), it will have multiple EVSE IDs, so one would have to put multiple values separated by ; in ref:EU:EVSE for it, complicating the situation noticeably (require different UI, checking if all EVSE IDs have been entered or only some etc).

Personally, It makes more sense to me only asking for EVSE on man_made=charge_point, as it is per-charging-point property AFAIK. If people are interested in micromapping EVSE ID, they should also map charging point themselves (that would require enabling in man_made=charge_point it StreetComplete's Things Overlay first, though)

[riQQ]

Personally, It makes more sense to me only asking for EVSE on man_made=charge_point, as it is per-charging-point property AFAIK. If people are interested in micromapping EVSE ID, they should also map charging point themselves (that would require enabling in man_made=charge_point it StreetComplete's Things Overlay first, though)

A charge point can also have multiple EVSE IDs. See https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:man_made%3Dcharge_point