Figure out a dirt cheap way to convert a regular outdoor outlet (ubiquitous already, on light poles and in landscaping, often used for holiday lighting or hedge

Figure out a dirt cheap way to convert a regular outdoor outlet (ubiquitous already, on light poles and in landscaping, often used for holiday lighting or hedge trimmers, etc) into one that can be metered. Just a microntroller chip with Bluetooth or WiFi or NFC (or even just a number pad… could use a real time clock inside with an RSA token type solution) and a relay is all you need. The customer’s smartphone could handle the connection to the net. “Pay 15¢/kWh, and we’ll enable the relay for that amount of energy to be transferred.” (Or could be via time.) Apartment owners could also do this, as they almost all have outlets in their garages that they (infuriatingly) usually don’t let EV owners use. Some parking lots in the north have outlets for engine block heaters. Figure out how to do that for $50-100 worth of hardware (should be easy; I see smart outlets for less than that… $20 or even $10) and you’ve made a huge improvement on electric vehicle charging infrastructure. We already have ubiquitous electric vehicle charging infrastructure, it’s just that people don’t realize it, yet. Every BnB I’ve stayed at since getting a BEV/PHEV has had an outlet that I could use to charge when I asked. A LOT of even on-street parking has outlets within reach and they could be integrated into meters, too.