UK Weighs Credits for Carmakers Fitting Vehicle-to-Grid Tech
Ministers are considering ZEV mandate incentives for cars that can sell power back to the grid. Campaigners say carmakers could use the credits to sell more petrol models.
Ministers are considering incentives for car manufacturers that fit "vehicle to grid" (V2G) technology, as part of a review of the zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) mandate. The idea is to back electric cars that can act as "power plants on wheels" while helping UK manufacturers.
V2G lets drivers charge automatically when electricity is cheap overnight and sell some of it back to the grid when demand is high. If millions of cars could send power back, or run the driver's home, it could help balance the grid on still, cloudy or dark days when wind and solar output falls short of demand. That would reduce the need to fire up expensive gas power plants. Home batteries can do the same job.
Credits for fitting the kit
A government consultation that closed on Friday sets out the plan. Carmakers would earn a credit for each car sold with V2G, also called bidirectional charging. A credit would let a manufacturer sell another petrol car without risking fines for missing ZEV targets. The government is preparing to cut the sales targets, and environmental groups expect changes that could mean an extra 147m tonnes of carbon emitted by 2050.
Ben Nelmes, chief executive of the thinktank New AutoMotive, called V2G "exciting technology" but said carmakers should be rewarded only "if it's actually used, not just for fitting it". One or two credits worth around £4,000 each would hand manufacturers thousands per car for kit that costs a few hundred pounds, he said, even though few drivers own the expensive charger needed to use it.
Vicky Edmonds, chief executive of the Electric Vehicle Association England, said it was "far too early" to give manufacturers a credit that effectively allows them to sell fewer EVs for a technology not yet tested at scale.
Where it stands now
Some drivers already sell electricity back through companies such as Octopus Energy in the UK, Renault in France and BMW in Germany. Octopus has claimed drivers could save £620 a year.
Smart charging tariffs, which do not need V2G, already encourage owners to charge when power is abundant and cheap, reducing the need to pay renewable generators to switch off.
The National Energy System Operator forecasts that V2G cars could supply the equivalent of a power station by 2030, with 1.2 gigawatts on demand. That could reach as much as 41 GW by 2050, enough to meet more than a quarter of peak demand.
Source: The Guardian