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🔗 Technical · 8 min read

GIREVE and the interoperability of charging stations in France: a complete guide

GIREVE is the national roaming platform for electric vehicles. For fleet managers and IRVE operators, understanding how it works is essential to offer their users access to 180,000+ charge points without multiplying contracts.

What is GIREVE?

GIREVE (Groupement pour l'Itinérance des Recharges Électriques de Véhicules) is a national data hub created in 2013 at the initiative of EDF, Total, Michelin and the Caisse des Dépôts. Its role is to ensure interoperability between all charging station networks in France — which allows a driver to charge anywhere with a single badge or a single app, regardless of the charging station brand.

In 2026, GIREVE connects:

  • 180,000+ charge points in France (i.e. more than 85% of publicly accessible charging stations)
  • 40+ mobility operators (eMSP: Chargemap, TotalEnergies, Engie, Shell, etc.)
  • 200+ charge point operators (CPO) certified, including Sparklin
  • A European network via Hubject and EMSP covering 15+ countries

OCPI: the standardised roaming protocol

Interoperability relies on the OCPI (Open Charge Point Interface) protocol, currently in version 2.2.1. It is the standard that allows the systems of CPOs (charge point operators) and eMSPs (mobility operators) to exchange in real time the information required for a roaming charging session:

  • Availability of charging stations and real-time status (free/occupied/out of service)
  • Tariffs applicable to the roaming user
  • Authentication of the user (RFID badge, QR code, app)
  • Session: start, consumption, stop
  • CDR (Charge Detail Record): session report for billing

The difference with OCPP (charging station↔management software protocol): OCPI handles the dialogue between operators, while OCPP handles the dialogue between the physical charging station and its supervision software. The two protocols are complementary and indispensable in a modern IRVE ecosystem.

CPO, eMSP, HPC: who does what in the IRVE ecosystem?

CPO
Charge Point Operator

The operator that deploys and runs the charging stations. Sparklin is a CPO. It is responsible for the availability of the charging stations and for their connection to GIREVE via OCPI.

eMSP
e-Mobility Service Provider

The operator that provides badges and apps to end users (Chargemap, TotalEnergies Charge+, Engie, etc.). It bills the service to the user and pays the CPO.

HPC
Hub Platfom Coordinator

The interoperability hub (GIREVE in France) that connects all CPOs and eMSPs through a single exchange point, avoiding bilateral connections between each pair of operators.

How does roaming work in practice?

Take the case of an employee of a Sparklin customer company who finds themselves on the motorway and needs to charge at a TotalEnergies charging station:

  1. The employee presents their Sparklin badge (RFID) at the TotalEnergies charging station
  2. The TotalEnergies charging station queries GIREVE to authenticate the badge
  3. GIREVE contacts Sparklin (the badge's CPO) to verify access rights
  4. Sparklin validates the authorisation — the charging station starts the charge
  5. At the end of the session, a CDR is sent to Sparklin via GIREVE
  6. Sparklin bills the employee's company and pays TotalEnergies its share

This entire process takes place in under 3 seconds. The user has nothing to do — their single badge works on 180,000+ charge points.

Centralised billing: the advantage for fleet managers

Without GIREVE roaming, a company managing 50 electric vehicles would have to:

  • Take out subscriptions with each network (TotalEnergies, Engie, Shell, Chargemap...)
  • Manage several monthly invoices and several badges per vehicle
  • Manually validate charging expense reports for business travel

With Sparklin (GIREVE-certified), the company has a single monthly invoice consolidating all charging: on site, at home via the Sparklin by go-e, and roaming across the network's 180,000+ charge points. Spark Pilot provides a unified dashboard by vehicle, by driver and by site.

Sparklin: a GIREVE-certified operator since 2023

Sparklin has been a certified CPO operator on the GIREVE platform since 2023. This certification involves:

  • A direct OCPI 2.2.1 connection to the GIREVE platform
  • A guaranteed response time for badge authentication in roaming (<2 s)
  • Real-time reporting of the availability of all Sparklin charging stations on navigation apps (PlugShare, ABRP, ChargeMap, etc.)
  • Centralised monthly billing for multi-site companies
  • Access to the European network via Hubject for cross-border travel

Checklist for becoming a compliant CPO operator via GIREVE

If you want to open your private car park to the public (with billing) and join the GIREVE network, here are the technical prerequisites:

  1. ✅ OCPP 2.0.1-compatible charging stations — mandatory for communication with the management software
  2. ✅ OCPI 2.2.1-certified CSMS supervision software — Spark Pilot is natively compatible
  3. ✅ MID-certified meters on the charging stations — mandatory for energy-based billing to the public
  4. ✅ GIREVE contract or access via a certified operator (Sparklin can provide you with GIREVE connectivity without you having to become a CPO yourself)
  5. ✅ EVSE identifiers (standardised EVSE-ID format) assigned to each charge point
  6. ✅ Price display on or near the charging station (legal requirement since 2022)
Access 180,000+ charge points

As a GIREVE-certified operator, Sparklin gives you access to the entire European charging network through a single contract and a single monthly invoice.

Activate GIREVE roaming →
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