Abstract
The adoption of electric vehicles is incentivized by governments around the world to decarbonize the mobility sector. Simultaneously, the continuously increasing amount of renewable energy sources and electric devices such as heat pumps and electric vehicles leads to congested grids. To meet this challenge, several forms of flexibility markets are currently being researched. So far, no analysis has calculated the actual flexibility potential of electric vehicles with different operating strategies, electricity tariffs and charging power levels while taking into account realistic user behavior. Therefore, this paper presents a detailed case study of the flexibility potential of electric vehicles for fixed and dynamic prices, for three charging power levels in consideration of Californian and German user behavior. The model developed uses vehicle and mobility data that is publicly available from field trials in the USA and Germany, cost-optimizes the charging process of the vehicles, and then calculates the flexibility of each electric vehicle for every 15 min. The results show that positive flexibility is mostly available during either the evening or early morning hours. Negative flexibility follows the periodic vehicle availability at home if the user chooses to charge the vehicle as late as possible. Increased charging power levels lead to increased amounts of flexibility. Future research will focus on the integration of stochastic forecasts for vehicle availability and electricity tariffs.
Highlights
Scarcity of fossil fuels, oil price fluctuations, and increased awareness of the negative impacts caused by anthropogenic climate change have led to an increasing use of variable renewable energy (VRE) sources
In order to analyze the realistic flexibility potential of electric vehicles (EV) in a distribution grid, this paper describes a detailed case study conducted with vehicle field trial data from California, USA and Germany, three electricity tariffs, two controller strategies, and three charging power levels
The third and fourth rows of plots show the flexible power per available EV for the five operating strategies operating strategies on weekdays and weekends
Summary
Oil price fluctuations, and increased awareness of the negative impacts caused by anthropogenic climate change have led to an increasing use of variable renewable energy (VRE) sources. Ma et al define flexibility as the “the ability of a power system to cope with variability and uncertainty in both generation and demand, while maintaining a satisfactory level of reliability at a reasonable cost, over different time horizons” [1]. While this definition describes the general characteristic of flexibility, the Union of the Electricity Industry—Eurelectric—defines flexibility in a more application-oriented way, as “the modification of generation injection and/or consumption patterns in reaction to an external signal (price signal or activation) in order to provide a service
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