G3-Alliance Certification Release V8, published July 3, 2026, extends G3-Hybrid power-line communication (PLC) certification to battery-powered gas and water meters for the first time. Previously limited to mains-powered electricity meters, G3-PLC certification now covers multi-utility metering on a single network — and, in Semitech’s view, marks a step toward the kind of certified, utility-owned grid-edge communication backbone that Home-to-Grid (H2G) and Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) programs will increasingly rely on. The release, detailed in G3-Alliance’s Q2 2026 newsletter , closes a long-standing gap: G3-PLC certification had covered electricity meters, which draw constant power from the mains to run a PLC modem, but not battery-powered gas and water meters, which previously needed separate RF or cellular connectivity. Release V8’s new certification profile lets battery-powered devices join the same G3-PLC mesh, enabling true multi-utility AMI on one network. An Enabling Step for Home-to-Grid and Vehicle-to-Grid G3-Alliance’s own charter has named electric vehicle charging and in-home energy management as target applications for G3-PLC since the Alliance was founded in 2011 , alongside its original metering use case. Release V8 doesn’t change the EV charging protocol itself — ISO 15118 EV-to-charger communication runs on a separate power-line technology, HomePlug GreenPHY, not G3-PLC. What it does is widen the certified device base of the same multi-application grid-edge PLC ecosystem that utilities are building out for metering, home energy management, and — per G3-Alliance’s stated scope — EV charging and grid monitoring. That matters for H2G and V2G deployments specifically: both depend on a utility having reliable, granular visibility into grid-edge load and generation — the same visibility a fully certified, multi-utility G3-PLC metering network provides. As utilities extend certified PLC coverage to more meters and more devices behind the meter, they build more of the grid-edge data and communication infrastructure that H2G and V2G coordination ultimately needs, even where the EV-charging link itself runs on a different PLC standard. This is Semitech’s strategic read on the announcement — G3-Alliance’s release notes don’t make the H2G/V2G connection explicitly, but the application scope the Alliance has defined since 2011 points in this direction. Semitech Semiconductor builds G3-PLC-compliant SoCs for exactly this kind of deployment. Our SM2400 is designed to support the low-power, battery-friendly operation Release V8’s certification profile requires, so utilities evaluating multi-utility metering — and the grid-edge data foundation H2G and V2G programs will draw on — don’t have to trade network unification against modem power budget. For utilities and meter OEMs planning multi-year AMI rollouts, this certification removes one of the last technical reasons to run separate networks for electricity versus gas and water — and adds one more piece to the grid-edge communication layer that distributed-energy coordination will be built on. Questions About G3-Alliance Release V8 What is G3-Alliance Certification Release V8? It’s a certification profile published by G3-Alliance in its Q2 2026 newsletter (July 3, 2026) that extends G3-Hybrid PLC certification to battery-powered gas and water meters, which previously could not be certified for G3-PLC networks because the standard assumed mains-powered devices. Does this mean G3-PLC now powers EV charging communication? No. EV-to-charger communication under ISO 15118 runs on a different power-line communication technology, HomePlug GreenPHY, not G3-PLC. Release V8 extends metering certification; it does not change or merge the two PLC standards. Why does Semitech connect this to Home-to-Grid and Vehicle-to-Grid? G3-Alliance’s own charter has listed electric vehicle charging and in-home energy management as target applications for G3-PLC since 2011, alongside metering. In Semitech’s