As part of a move to make the transition away from fossil fuel automobiles more economical, Ofgem aims to make it simpler for electric car drivers to sell the stored energy in the car batteries back to the power grid. According to a scheme proposed by the UK’s energy regulator, electric vehicle owners might earn money by essentially converting their cars into the mobile power plants and transferring power back to an energy network when usage on the electrical grid reaches a peak.
If enough drivers take advantage of the opportunity to profit from their car batteries by adopting vehicle-to-grid technology, United Kingdom may be able to avoid building new power plants with the capacity of up to ten major nuclear power plants.
According to Ofgem, this might help keep energy bills low even for homes in the United Kingdom that do not possess an electric vehicle.
Electric vehicles are predicted to increase to 14 million on UK roads by 2030, necessitating billions in investment to update the power grid. However, Ofgem expects that by modifying its grid rules, it will be able to achieve significant savings for the consumer bills and energy system. At the end of May 2022, there were roughly 535,000 electric vehicles on UK roads, including plug-in hybrids.
The regulator in the United Kingdom intends to make it more affordable for charging points to connect to the power grid, allowing more drivers to have accessibility to charging stations when they need them. When the demand is low and the power is cheap, Ofgem will encourage “smart” car charging to make greater electricity use before transferring cheap energy back to a grid utilizing vehicle-to-grid innovation when demand rises.
Ofgem director Neil Kenward said the regulator was going to take a “three-pronged strategy” to reduce costs for all GB bill payers by expanding the usage of electric vehicles, “smart” car charging, and vehicle-to-grid technologies.
“Electric vehicles will revolutionize the way we use energy and present customers with new options to interact in the energy market through smart products to keep their prices as low as possible,” he said.
National Grid’s head of future markets, Graeme Cooper, called Ofgem’s smart charging proposal “an essential step” to minimize the transition’s impact on electric vehicles on home bills.
“There will be an increase in energy demand, so we need to make sure we’re future-proofing, installing the right cables in the right places to meet future demand,” he stated. “Smart charging effectively allows the car to ‘talk’ to the grid, utilizing data to determine when the optimal time to charge your car is,” Cooper explained. “It is a more cost-effective, energy-efficient, and long-term method of charging electric cars.”