Vehicle to grid (V2G) trail results are starting to come in.
Owners of electric vehicles may soon be able to get paid for simply plugging their car into the wall. But there are a few things to consider first.
From the V2G post there are a few points ASF members should be aware of IMO, this is especially important if you are interested in the V2G side of the EV purchase.
The article also shows the importance of taking a steady, steady approach to BEV adoption and uptake and as I said the recently signed free trade agreement with the U.K will help enormously with Australia's transition to BEV's IMO.
The whole article is very interesting IMO, below are some excerpts from the article:
In July last year,
one of the first Australian V2G trials began in the ACT, led by the Australian National University (ANU).
The two-year Realising Electric Vehicles-to-grid Services (REVS) trial would test V2G on a fleet of 51 mostly ACT Government EVs.
But it quickly hit a roadblock: bi-directional chargers (that can charge EV batteries and also export power from these batteries to the grid) had not been certified for use in Australia.
That's now been resolved and the newly certified chargers are on their way.
"I see the trial operating by the end of the year," said Geoffrey Rutledge, ACT government lead on emissions reduction.
By 2025, all new EVs will be V2G capable
If all of Australia's 19 million cars were EVs, they would hold a truly staggering amount of energy.
Bjorn Sturmberg, research leader at ANU's Battery Storage and Grid Integration Program, which is leading the REVS trial, calculates it would be equivalent to more than 10,000 Tesla Big Batteries.
He said Australia was well placed to take advantage of V2G, due to it being a world leader in rooftop solar.
"Because of that, we have quite a lot of industry engagement from the electricity sector," he said.
But there's a long way to go.
The battery technology used in most EVs today, called CCS, is not compatible with V2G.
Of the cars sold in Australia, only the Nissan Leaf ZE1 and Mistubishi Outlander plug-in have V2G charging capability.
But that's due to change. By 2025, all new EVs will be V2G capable.
But the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) still sees "enormous potential" in V2G, says its chief executive officer Darren Miller.
The agency is providing more than $7.5 million in funding for four projects looking into V2G and smart charging (charging EVs during off-peak hours), including the REVs trial.
"We have heard people talk about EVs as "batteries on wheels", and when you project forward the inevitable uptake of EVs in the years ahead, you can appreciate the huge energy storage potential that will exist in the EV fleet," Mr Miller said.
"In Australia we’re just beginning to start our V2G journey.
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It is really only just starting to kick off around the world, as no country has adopted the technology at scale yet.
"We expect to see a few more years of trials and a bigger range of V2G-enabled car models with a larger consumer uptake before things truly take off."
Whereas popping a solar panel on the roof to make power and use less energy from the grid is pretty straightforward and easy to understand, V2G is more complex, Dr Lucas-Healey said.
"You're giving a third-party permission to do things with your battery. It's a complex piece of kit interacting with a complex system, which is the grid."
A Facebook page for EV owners taking part in V2G trials in the UK is full of complaints about technological glitches and punitive tariffs.
Several participants said they would switch to vehicle-to-home charging (V2H) upon completing the trial. The main reason they took part in the trial was to collect a free bi-directional charger.