Evaluation of the challenges and opportunities of Vehicle-to-Grid technology and the potential revenue streams for BEV fleet owners and aggregators

Abstract: The increasing amount of renewable energy being connected to the power grid, and the intermittent nature of these resources, calls for increased grid flexibility to ensure operational safety and stability. An effective solution to address this need could be through wider implementation of various energy storage technologies. Stationary lithium-ion battery energy storage systems have already been successfully deployed at various locations around the world and has a proven track record of providing valuable services to the grid. The increasing number of battery electric vehicles could imply a vast untapped resource of flexibility as they rely on similar battery technology.Realising this potential could be achieved through the successful implementation and adoption of vehicle-to-grid technology, enabling bi-directional charging between BEVs and the power grid. This thesis first explores the concept of vehicle-to-grid technology through a literature review. The second part of this thesis aims to quantify the revenue potential from one identified value stream for vehicle-to-grid enabled vehicles. This is done through the development of a model, quantifying the revenues generated from participation on the Swedish balancing markets with a fleet of electric trucks over one year. The literature review reveals over 100 documented projects worldwide with physically implemented vehicle-to-grid technology. Different AC- and DC system configurations are being tested as well as the implementation of standards and protocols developed by stakeholders in the vehicle-to-grid ecosystem. Key focus areas have been to ensure interoperability and safety, whilst social aspects of vehicle-to-grid technology remains inadequately explored in existing literature. Numerous value streams can be derived from vehicle-to-grid enabled vehicles and like stationary energy storage systems, its full economic potential can be unlocked by stacking these value streams. Focusing solely on one value stream, the model presented in the second part of this thesis indicates a yearly revenue potential ranging from EUR 6,577 to EUR 85,503 per electric truck participating in the FCR-D Up market in Sweden. However, as the developed model does not consider any costs associated with enabling this participation, no further insights regarding the profitability of V2G-enabled vehicles can be derived from the case study and should be subject for future work.