Using EV charging control to provide building load flexibility

Area of Science:

• Energy Systems Engineering
• Smart Grid Technologies
• Building Energy Management

Background:

• Buildings consume a substantial portion of electrical energy, contributing significantly to overall grid load.
• Integrating renewable energy sources necessitates flexible building loads to balance generation variability.
• Traditional stationary storage solutions for load flexibility are often prohibitively expensive.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the cost reduction potential of electric vehicle (EV) charging control for flexible building loads.
• To assess the impact of unidirectional and bidirectional EV charging on stationary storage requirements.
• To develop and evaluate a model-predictive control algorithm for reshaping building load profiles.

Main Methods:

• Design and implementation of a model-predictive control (MPC) algorithm for building load reshaping.
• Simulation of two realistic use cases to evaluate the MPC algorithm's performance.
• Quantification of stationary storage reduction achieved through EV charging control strategies.

Main Results:

• The developed EV charging control strategy effectively reshapes building loads to match desired profiles.
• EV charging control significantly reduces the required amount of stationary storage compared to existing methods.
• Bidirectional EV charging demonstrates a substantial further reduction in stationary storage needs.

Conclusions:

• Exploiting EV charging, particularly bidirectional charging, is a cost-effective strategy for enhancing building load flexibility.
• The MPC algorithm successfully minimizes stationary storage requirements by leveraging EV charging infrastructure.
• This approach offers a practical solution for integrating higher levels of renewable energy into the grid.