CleanSpark Enters EV Charging Market Through GridFabric Platform

CleanSpark, Inc. (Nasdaq: CLSK), a diversified software and services company, announced that it is entering the Electric Vehicle (EV) charging station space through its recently acquired, wholly-owned subsidiary GridFabric, LLC. GridFabric is an OpenADR (Automatic Demand Response) communications compliance and certification company. The new initiative will be focused on providing software solutions to aid in load management for EV charging stations and balancing the impact the increased power demand has on the traditional grid.

On September 23, 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced a phase out of gasoline-powered cars by 2035 as part of the State's fight against climate change. As part of the initiative the Office of the Governor stated, "To ensure needed infrastructure to support zero-emission vehicles, the order requires state agencies, in partnership with the private sector, to accelerate deployment of affordable fueling and charging options. It also requires support of new and used zero-emission vehicle markets to provide broad accessibility to zero-emission vehicles for all Californians."

EV fast-charging will create an additional burden on the existing, aging power grid.  Public utilities will likely need to upgrade their existing infrastructure to handle the additional load, as well as rely more on demand management programs and load-balancing to increase overall grid stability. EV charging locations that plan to participate in these programs will be required, in certain jurisdictions, to utilize certified communications protocols.

The OpenADR protocol allows EV charging companies and their customers to communicate with the utilities for demand response programs. These programs, in turn, allow the utility to more easily manage power distribution to the grid. 

GridFabric offers a method of rapidly implementing OpenADR and providing the corresponding certification. GridFabric has provided its OpenADR software to two EV charging companies since its acquisition by CleanSpark in August 2020and has additional proposals pending with a number of EV charging companies.

GridFabric | www.gridfabric.io

CleanSpark I http://www.cleanspark.com