By John Anderson, March 29, 2015 for gizmag.com
Like a mini power plant, this electric vehicle can bid on energy in California’s wholesale power market.
The California utility, San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E), has begun bidding energy resources from fleets of electric vehicles and storage systems into the state’s wholesale power market. The pilot program, one of the first of its kind, is meant to provide insights into how electric vehicles and other kinds of distributed energy resources can make the grid more reliable and efficient.
The project is expected to end in late 2015, with the planners hoping to glean valuable information on electric vehicle-grid integration and grid energy distribution. This grid-to-vehicle relationship is seen as a key factor in planning a more distributed energy grid, allowing EVs to charge at night when demand is low and acting as a grid resource when demand is high.
The issue with renewable energy, such as wind and solar, is its reliance on intermittent sources, combined with a lack of robust, efficient storage systems. California’s solar panels produce most of their energy during the middle of the day, but taper off in the evening when consumer energy needs are traditionally highest. Meanwhile, electric car batteries and other energy storage systems typically need recharging on a daily basis, if not more often.
The challenge for utilities such as SDG&E is integrating electric vehicles into the grid and efficiently allocating energy resources to the right place at the cheapest time, while benefiting both the customer and the supplier. The idea is to find workable solutions now, while the market is still relatively small. SDG&E says more than 13,000 electric vehicles are in use in its territory, while the state’s Zero-Emission Vehicles (ZEV) Action Plan wants to put 1.5 million zero-emissions vehicles on the road by 2025. The San Diego utility plans to add at least 5,500 EV charging stations during that time.
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