Client: Hydro-Québec

Scope: EV Network Blocking Probability Prediction & Capacity Increase Simulation

The Challenge: The "Discovery Lag" Illusion

Imagine building a brand-new EV charging station to relieve long wait times, only to watch drivers continue queuing up at the older station down the road.

That’s exactly what Hydro-Québec faced during the busy 2024/2025 winter. Older chargers absorbed almost all the traffic. On paper, it looked like the network was failing, even though new capacity had just been added.

Why was this happening? It all came down to human habit, or what we call the "discovery lag". When new chargers are built, it takes drivers three to six months to actually find, trust, and start using them. Because of this lag, Hydro-Québec couldn't simply rely on raw data to plan their network. They needed a smarter way to look past temporary driver habits, figure out where the real bottlenecks were, and add capacity before drivers got stranded.

Zoniq’s Solution: Real-World Context and "What-If" Simulations

To solve this, we stepped away from standard metrics and built a forecasting tool focused on "Blocking Probability" - predicting the percentage of time a charging site would be completely full. We kept the heavy math under the hood and focused on practical insights: 

• Looking at the Bigger Picture: Instead of evaluating single, isolated stations, we grouped locations into regional clusters. We then factored in real-world context, like how close a station is to major highways or local shops, which tells us much more about driver behavior than historical data alone.
• Filtering out the Noise: To prevent the extreme winter congestion spikes from skewing our future forecasts, we built smart filters to recognize and cap these unusual events.
• The Capacity Simulator: We built a tool that acts as a testing ground for the years 2026 and 2027. By freezing the network as it stood and injecting future EV growth forecasts, Hydro-Québec could virtually test adding power in 50 kW increments to see exactly what it would take to keep wait times acceptable.

The Outcome: Happier Drivers, Smarter Spending

By shifting from a reactive "wait-and-see" approach to proactive planning, the impact for Hydro-Québec was massive. First, it prevented them from wasting millions in capital on premature upgrades at stations that simply needed time to be "discovered." Second, they can now accurately pinpoint and upgrade the clusters that are in genuine danger of failing.

The ultimate result? A drastic reduction in peak wait times, a seamless, reliable charging experience that eliminates range anxiety for drivers, and a much smarter, leaner way to allocate infrastructure budgets.

“Our existing planning tools already gave us a solid understanding of network demand. Zoniq’s solution complements that foundation by enabling us to validate deployment decisions with greater precision and identify where additional chargers will deliver the most benefit to drivers.”

Jean-Luc Dupré, Head of Engineering and Operations, Hydro-Québec