Electric vehicles can return power to the grid or your home during a power outage

The Washington Post sounded the alarm earlier this month with a story that concluded that the electrical grid will not be ready for all electric vehicles that want to plug in, ”the article reads. “America’s power grid is being challenged by the need to provide clean power to these cars. It barely works during periods of normal stress and fails far too often for comfort, as has been demonstrated by widespread power outages in California, Texas, Louisiana, and elsewhere. ”

But what if the battery-powered cars, trucks and buses could help by bringing power back into our battered grid when it is needed most? This is the premise of V2G or Vehicle-to-Grid, which states that electric vehicles (EV) can be connected to the grid to 95% when idling and upload electricity (as agreed between the electricity provider and the vehicle owner). After all, reports Moixa, 10 new Nissan Leafs can store as much energy as 1,000 households normally use in one hour.

The concept dates back to the early 2000s when electric vehicles were still in the bud. At the University of Delaware, Professor Willet Kempton created test programs using mini-electrics. “You need technology that can go online quickly, safely and in a balanced way, for example to replace solar energy when the sun wasn’t shining this afternoon, or wind when it was a windless day. V2G can do it, ”said Kempton.

Willett Kempton (center) from the University of Delaware and his V2G experiments.

University of Delaware

V2G has shown promise for a while, but commercial applications have been slow to take off. Most of them are pilot programs, like a 50-vehicle test in Australia. But that’s changing. In Beverly, Massachusetts, a Proterra-powered Thomas Built electric school bus (with a 226 kilowatt-hour battery) returned electricity to the grid for more than 50 hours over the summer. The utility consumed nearly three megawatt hours of electricity during 30 upload events. The average American household consumes 11 megawatt hours per year.

The program was carried out in collaboration with Highland Electric Fleets and National Grid. Proterra developed the bidirectional charging system in the bus. In this case, V2G is green because the bus service was reduced during times of high demand. A bus won’t make much of a difference, but a fleet of them could make it unnecessary to turn on fossil fuel “peak” power plants.

“By bringing stored clean energy back into the grid when it is needed most, electric school buses can help create a more resilient local power system and reduce reliance on expensive fossil-fuel power plants,” said Gareth Joyce, President of Proterra. School buses stand around a lot, usually transporting students six hours a day, 200 days a year. And they take the summer off. Then there is a great need for air conditioning.

In March, Volkswagen announced that its new electric vehicles could be charged bidirectionally from 2022. Bloomberg says their combined 296 gigawatt-hours of lithium-ion batteries with 10 million electric vehicles on the road have eight times the capacity of grid-scale stationary batteries currently installed worldwide.

Consumers who return electricity to the grid are compensated for it, but the source of income is unlikely to be a major selling point. According to Gizmodo, Australia’s V2G program electric vehicles will upload electricity a few dozen times over the course of a year, each for no more than 15 minutes, earning owners about Australian $ 1,000 ($ 747) annually.

Something else could excite buyers, V2H or vehicle home. The new Ford F-150 Lightning Electric Truck is capable of supplying power to a construction site or a house with a power outage. To get this capability, owners must ditch the base vehicle for $ 40,000 and purchase the extended range version with an onboard dual charging system that can be charged at 19.2 kilowatts. When charged quickly, it can add 54 miles of range in 10 minutes. For home use, the Ford 80-amp bidirectional charging station Pro must be installed.

In the front “frunk” of the Lightning there are four 120-volt plugs and two USBs with a total of 2.4 kilowatts. The 20 ampere 120 volt power supply can operate all desired power tools. The sockets in the pickup bed offer 7.2 kilowatts, which, according to Motor Trend, is sufficient to supply a welding machine or a home air conditioning system with electricity. And with the Charge Station Pro, the dark house can benefit from a whopping 9.6 kilowatts of power. The car can leave the lights on for about three days.

Dcbels $ 5,000 r16 can make your home buzz from two-way electric cars.

Dcbel

In April, a Montreal-based company called Dcbel showed off a $ 5,000 system, the r16, which can charge two electric cars with solar power at the same time, but can also tap into bi-directional cars (the Nissan Leaf, the Kia EV6, the Mitsubishi Outlander, and these future ones VWs) as a backup source for the home. Tesla’s Powerwall battery storage can also be a rescue package for a power outage at home.

When Texas suffered its blackout last February (which caused Senator Ted Cruz to sprint to Cancun) resourceful homeowners used their F-150 PowerBoost hybrids as backup power – they also have 120- and 240-volt chargers in their beds. As climate change intensifies, causing more floods, heat waves and power outages, V2H is an idea whose time has come. Anyway, they’re happy in Beverly, Massachusetts. “We look forward to taking full advantage of the economic, environmental and operational benefits of V2G technology,” said Beverly Mayor Mike Cahill.