State-owned distributor Horizon Power says a trial using bi-directional charging with electric vehicles to supplement the grid and take up excess power has proved a success.
The 12-month trial was conducted in Exmouth, a town of nearly 3,000 people in Western Australia’s north-west, and involved testing Horizon’s Distributed Energy Resource Management System (DERMS) in real-world conditions.
It makes use of a vehicle’s large battery to both power the car and power the supply grid when parked, known as vehicle-to-grid services, or V2G.
Ray Achemedei, executive general of manager technology and digital transformation at Horizon Power, explained the trial to Nadia Mitsopoulos on ABC Radio Perth.
“Basically what we did is we got a fleet of Nissan Leafs and we allocated those Leafs to some partners up at Exmouth,” Mr Achemedei said.
“The agreement was that they would get to use these Leafs day in, day out and help participate in some trials along the way.
Nissan Leaf electric vehicles ship with bi-directional charging, able to direct power back into the grid from the battery. (AAP: Essential Energy)
“We used our DERMS platform to issue instructions to the EVs and send signals to the batteries on those EVs to either discharge energy [to the grid] or to charge the battery itself at different times under different conditions to see how that went.
“The real objective was to see if the batteries could deliver an outcome that would be to the benefit of the customer, as well as to us, the utility provider, and do it in a way that didn’t disrupt the customer’s experience.”
The DERMS platform was able to draw power from the EVs’ batteries at times of high demand, and at times of low demand implement fast charging into the cars to ease stress on the system.
Settings were in place to ensure the batteries were never entirely drained, leaving the user still able to jump in the car if they needed to go somewhere.
Gary earns money by plugging his car into the wall
Managing power demand
Mr Achemedei said the trial showed the role EVs could play in creating a “far more stable grid”.
He said it could be particularly significant for small tourist towns that attracted an influx of visitors at certain times of the year, creating fluctuating demands for power.
“What we’re anticipating is as EVs become more and more prevalent, the likelihood of EVs turning up in places like Exmouth, Broome, Esperance et cetera is going continue to increase,” he said.
“The need to be able to manage them well is going to be quite important for us.
“So Exmouth was just a perfect example of a system where we could conduct a trial like this.
“The trial’s been a great validation of what is a far more strategic plan for us looking into the future as we start to see EVs become more prevalent, especially in the small systems that we manage across the state.”
Exmouth, 1,300 kilometres north of Perth, is a popular holiday spot with fluctuating energy needs. (ABC Pilbara: Kate Ferguson)
The feedback from the people who drove the cars was also positive, even overcoming doubts about whether EVs could work in a remote location.
“The feedback that we got is that they loved participating in the trial for a variety of reasons,” Mr Achemedei said.
“In the regions there is a little bit of scepticism around EVs because the distances are vast. Range anxiety is prevalent.
“In fact we had a hard time at the end of the trial getting some of our EVs back. They wanted to hang on to them.”Electric cars could help protect against blackouts
One of the trial participants, Amanda Willmott, the acting director of the Gascoyne Development Commission, said she was proud to have been involved in the trial.
“For small communities like this to be doing something so progressive, that’s incredible,” she said.
Another participant, shire president Matthew Niikkula, said the trial paved the way for a “more environmentally sustainable energy future” for the town.
Despite the success, Mr Achemedei said Horizon Power had no immediate plans to roll out DERMS more widely.
“The reality is there’s still a lot of business rules and technical standards that need to be agreed to,” he said.
Horizon Power says accessing vehicle battery storage could help manage periods of high and low grid demand. (ABC News: Andrew O’Connor)
“The customer experience is super important for us. This only works well if customers are a willing participant.
“They want to know that if they need to jump in their EV to do something suddenly that there’s going to be enough energy stored in their EV battery to be able to do what they need to do.”