Smart Charge Hawaii helps eligible electric vehicle drivers earn up to $150 or 10,000 HawaiianMiles for connecting their EVs to the grid. Track your EV charging at home and on the go in the free ev.energy app, and help improve grid reliability across the islands.
Sign up to Smart Charge Hawaii today.
How do I earn cash for charging?
Earn $75 per ev.energy account enrolled in the program.
Earn another $75 per account for continuing participation in the program through to May 31, 2024.
In lieu of cashback you may exchange this 12-month participation bonus for 5,000 Hawaiian Airlines miles for enrolling in the program and another 5,000 for continued participation.
Join hundreds of EV drivers earning rewards with Smart Charge Hawaii.
Smart Charge Hawaii uses the free ev.energy mobile app to connect to your car or home charger to the program. Download the ev.energy app and use invite code "SMARTCHARGEHI" to enroll in Smart Charge Hawaii today!
Your connected EV or home charger sends your charging data, including times you charge and energy consumption, to the ev.energy platform in real-time.
Your EV charging is summarized and displayed on your personalized Dashboard and Stats screens in the ev.energy app, including your estimated costs per charging session.
ev.energy will use the EV charging data we collect from your vehicle or charger to inform residential electricity service upgrades and infrastructure investments to improve the reliability of the islands’ power grid.
Join hundreds of EV drivers earning rewards with Smart Charge Hawaii.
If you need support with Smart Charge Hawaii, please refer to the FAQ or contact us by email at SmartChargeHI@ev.energy
Participants (18 and older) must also be located within Hawaiian Electric’s service territory and be a Hawaiian Electric electricity supply customer. This excludes residents based on the island of Kauai.
Smart Charge Hawaii’s program partner, ev.energy, is continually adding new vehicle models to expand the list of EVs and chargers that are compatible and eligible for program enrollment.
Below is the list of EV and charger models that ev.energy can currently connect to using the embedded internet connection within the vehicle/charger — but only if the internet connection has been enabled by the manufacturer and/or the driver.
Supported Chargers
Audi
BMW
Cadillac
Chevrolet
Chrysler
Hyundai
Mini
Nissan
Rivian
Tesla
Toyota
Volvo
If you drive an EV and your model isn’t on the above list, please join the Smart Charge Hawaii waitlist here. You will be the first to notified by email should your vehicle or charger become compatible with the ev.energy app over the course of the program.
Even if your EV has telematics capability, the auto manufacturer may still require you to pay for a connected-car subscription package to enable internet access.
Every EV has connection capabilities, either directly through the manufacturer's connected-car subscription package to enable internet connectivity, or through an internet-connected home charging station.
While some auto manufacturers offer subscription packages at no cost, others require drivers to purchase a paid subscription package and the cost can vary by manufacturer and dealership. The subscription costs must be borne by the customer and ev.energy is not liable for covering any of these costs.
ev.energy will engage with auto manufacturers and dealerships about these subscription costs, which we recognize may create financial barriers to participating in our program.
More details can be found on your EV manufacturer’s website:
- Audi
- BMW
- Cadillac
- Chevrolet
- Chrysler
- Ford
- Hyundai
- Mini
- Nissan
- Rivian
- Tesla
- Toyota
- Volvo
To check whether your EV has the capability to connect to the internet, enter your VIN (or select your vehicle make, model and trim) into this tool (do not proceed with creating a connected services account, you’ll need to do this within the ev.energy app).
Important: Please note, even if your EV has telematics capability, the auto manufacturer may still require you to pay for a connected-car subscription package to enable internet access.
You’ll need to set up a Toyota Remote Connect account for your vehicle. You can find instructions for doing so at this link.
Please note that you’ll need to set up your account with an email address and a password. Google Single Sign-on and Phone Number-based logins will not work.Once this is done, please check that:
- You can use your Toyota email and password to log into your Toyota account on the web, as well as through the Toyota mobile app on either an iPhone or Android device/
- Your vehicle is present in both locations.
- You can view your current battery/charge levels, along with other vehicle data through the Toyota web or mobile app.
You should then be able to select Toyota as your EV and connect it through SmartCar. If you have any difficulty, reach out to ownersupport@smartcar.com for assistance.
The "Action is required" error typically comes up when Toyota wants you to either set a new password, or accept new Terms and Conditions. You’ll need to log into both the Toyota website, as well as the mobile app, in order to find and clear out any actions required.
If you receive a "Subscription Inactive" or "No Compatible Vehicles" error, you’ll need to double check:
- Whether or not your vehicle is present on the above list of compatible vehicles
- Whether or not your have an active, paid Toyota Remote Connect subscription
- Whether or not you can view updated data for your vehicle in the mobile app
- Look for the vehicle’s current location and current battery levels to ensure data is flowing
If you can see vehicle data within the app, but still cannot connect through Smartcar, reach out to ownersupport@smartcar.com for assistance.
Unfortunately, newer Volvo models with Google built in (Android Auto) are not currently compatible with ev.energy and therefore not eligible to participate in Smart Charge Hawaii.
However, you can still register for the program and we will contact you if and when we can support Volvo models with Google built in.
If you charge your vehicle in an area with little or no internet connection, ev.energy cannot guarantee that your charging data will be collected accurately (or at all), and you may miss out on incentives.
Please try to charge your vehicle in an area with a reliable internet connection.
As of the end of 2022, all of the major US cellular networks shut down their 3G service, which some automakers relied on to provide internet connectivity to electric vehicles. Most modern cell phones have long since been updated to LTE/4G/5G networks, but vehicles are an entirely different matter.
You'll know if your EV was impacted by the 3G sunset in a few different ways:
- You may have been contacted by the auto dealership where you purchased your vehicle. Some dealerships are offering their customers a free or paid option to upgrade their EV's modem to a 4G modem to regain connectivity.
- You may see a notification when you open your vehicle’s mobile application. This notification will either let you know that your vehicle can no longer transmit its data, or it will give you the option to upgrade your vehicle’s modem.
- You may be able to set up your vehicle’s mobile app but get an error message any time you try to access your vehicle’s data.
If you believe you've been impacted by the 3G sunset, please reach out to your auto dealership. ev.energy is unfortunately unable to provide support on this topic.
SmartCharge Hawaii offers either one of $150 or 10,000 HawaiianMiles incentive per customer regardless of the number of EVs or chargers connected to ev.energy.
There is a $150 or 10,000 HawaiianMiles limit per customer – however, a customer may be one person within a household. If a spouse, partner, roommate or child has an EV, for example, they could register as a separate user (even if their registered Hawaiian Electric account number is the same).
You will receive your $75 enrollment incentive in early 2024, after connecting your vehicle to the ev.energy platform.
You will receive the remaining $75 completion incentive payment near the end of the pilot program in December 2024.
Alternatively, if you opt to receive HawaiianMiles instead of the cash incentive, you will receive 5,000 miles in early 2024 after connecting your vehicle to the ev.energy platform, and the remaining 5,000 near the end of the pilot program in December 2024.
We do not see or store your EV and/or charger username and password. Once you enter your username and password, we instantly exchange them with the manufacturer for a secure token that allows us to be able to continue to access your account and collect the charging data required as part of your participation in the Smart Charge Hawaii program. This token is stored securely and encrypted in ev.energy’s cloud platform, hosted by Amazon Web Services.
ev.energy will use aggregated data from this program to inform future rate design and grid planning.
ev.energy combines your charging data with that of all the other program participants and aggregates it into a set of metadata that is stored on ev.energy’s secure servers, which are hosted by Amazon Web Services.
By enrolling your vehicle in Smart Charge Hawaii and connecting it to ev.energy using telematics, you consent to ev.energy collecting the following data from your vehicle (at minimum): vehicle make, model, trim and year, vehicle identification number (VIN), battery size, vehicle battery state of charge, plug-in, unplug times, start and stop times of charging sessions, kWh of energy consumed by your vehicle, and vehicle charging location.
By enrolling your charging station in Smart Charge Hawaii and connecting it to ev.energy via the manufacturer, you consent to ev.energy collecting the following data from your charging station: charger make, model, charger serial number, and/or JuiceBox ID, plug-in, unplug times, start and stop times of charging sessions, and kWh of energy delivered via the charging station.
Once you disconnect your EV, we will no longer be able to collect charging data from your vehicle. Any data from previous charging sessions will be combined with other customers’ data. The aggregate data will be analyzed by ev.energy to assess the benefits of the program.
Should you wish to re-enroll, you will need to reconnect your vehicle to ev.energy within the ‘Account’ tab on the dashboard section of the app.
Once you disconnect your EV, we will no longer be able to collect charging data from your vehicle. Any data from previous charging sessions will be combined with other customers’ data. The aggregate data will be analyzed by ev.energy to assess the benefits of the program.
Should you wish to re-enroll, you will need to reconnect your vehicle to ev.energy within the Account section of the app, and you will not receive another enrollment incentive if you’ve already been paid one.
The ev.energy app does not control your vehicle's charging, and will not override the charging schedule preferences you have set in your vehicle or charging app.
To replace an EV you’ve already enrolled in Smart Charge Hawaii, go to the ‘Account’ tab in the ev.energy app, select the vehicle you would like to replace and click the “Replace my EV” button and add the new EV. Your old EV will be disconnected from ev.energy and data will no longer be shared with the Smart Charge Hawaii program.
As a reminder, you will not earn an additional $75 incentive for enrolling the new EV, but will still receive the $75 completion incentive at the end of the program.
You are free to stop participating in Smart Charge Hawaii at any time.
Disconnect your vehicle or charger within the ‘Account’ tab of the ev.energy app and confirm your unenrollment in writing to SmartChargeHI@ev.energy.
Access the Smart Charge Hawaii Participant Agreement here.
