Electric vehicles are becoming a viable alternative for most transportation needs. EnergyVille wants to facilitate the large scale adoption of electric vehicles, and is developing and implementing new concepts for a smart charging system.
Energy efficiency, no local air pollution, and the potential to use electricity from renewable sources: these are the main advantages of electric mobility. On the downside a large scale adoption of electric vehicles can put a bigger strain on the electricity grid. How can grid overload issues be avoided, while at the same time maximising the use of renewable electricity?
Advantages
Optimise the interaction between electrical vehicles and electricity grids
An electric vehicle might be plugged in for a whole night or day, while it may only need a couple of hours to fully charge. The EnergyVille Smart Charging System uses this flexibility to intelligently manage the charging process according to the operator preference:
- Peak shaving scenario: charge when the grid capacity is high (off-peak), or manage the simultaneous charging of several electrical vehicles in the same street or car park by spreading their demand over time.
- Renewable scenario: charge when the availability of renewable energy from sun and wind is high.
- Balancing scenario: keep demand/supply balanced.
In each scenario it is guaranteed that the electrical vehicle will be charged by the time the driver wants it to be charged, and to the level requested. EnergyVille offers its employees the use of a fleet of electric scooters for their daily commute in order to test the Smart Charging System at EnergyVille continuously and in real-life circumstances.
Application
The Smart Charging system can be integrated within:
- private and public car parks
- building + car park energy management systems
- home energy management systems
- energy aggregator systems
EnergyVille’s Smart Charging System concept is partly being developed within the Linear project, which is short for Local Intelligent Networks and Energy Active Regions. Linear is a large-scale project on Smart Grids in Flanders with 250 households. It focuses on optimising the use of the distribution grid and the connected distributed renewable energy sources. Linear is a cooperation between EnergyVille (VITO, KU Leuven and imec) and IBBT and is supported by the Flemish government and by a team of industrial partners. More information: www.linear-smartgrid.be.
Client
EnergyVille offers its know-how and experience with Smart Charging Systems to the industry and to organisations that are developing charging infrastructure for electric vehicles.
For more information, feel free to contact our expert.
