ERA-NET Smartgrid - "Increased Self Consumption of Photovoltaic Power for Electric Vehicle Charging in Virtual Networks"

In the EU project "Solarcharge2020", a concept with a virtual network of producers of solar electricity and charging stations for electric vehicles has been tested and evaluated on a large scale. The purpose of the project has been to test a large-scale model for electric vehicle charging with solar electricity at a city level. In addition to the overall goal of reducing carbon dioxide emissions, the purpose has been to evaluate how matching between production of solar energy and charging of electric vehicles can be optimized and how overall charging power control can reduce an increasing power requirement for charging electric vehicles. A new business model for this has been developed. The IT platform "Solarbank" has been used for all transmission and management of data within the network. All communication of data is based on industry-wide open standards to facilitate dissemination and up-scaling. In the cities of Uppsala (approx. 220,000 inhabitants) in Sweden and Tromsö (approx. 70,000 inhabitants) in Norway, 14 plants for production of solar electricity between 20 kW and 250 kW and about 200 charging stations have been connected to the network. All charging stations have been public with a charging power between 3.7 kW and 22 kW. The project has resulted in the development and application of methods and models to estimate electric car charging and solar power production in space and time at city level. The models have been presented at international scientific conferences and in scientific journals of the highest class, which resulted in the development of two different frameworks for modeling electric car charging and solar power production in urban environment. The models have been applied to Uppsala and Tromsö as case studies. These models have since been used to estimate the potential of smart electric car charging, something that the project intended to achieve in the long term. The project has shown that the charging power can be controlled overall for charging stations that use standardized protocols for communication regardless of manufacture or operator. This can create a real space for new renewable electricity production for electric car charging and, in addition, reduce the electricity grid both regionally and nationally. Electric car charging control can also create increased self-consumption of locally produced solar electricity. Improving the efficiency and clarity of the interaction between electricity production and consumption constitutes the basis for the proposed business model. The services for "Smart Solar Charging" developed in the project can partly avoid investment in new production and distribution of electric energy for new charging stations. This in turn means that more charging stations can be installed without increasing the capacity for supplying electricity.

The collaboration and researcher mobility between the two universities in the project has been successful. At UiT, the collaboration has led to increased knowledge and competency on electric transport and solar energy estimations, particularly using spatial methods. The project has shown that the charging power can be controlled overall for charging stations that use standardized protocols for communication regardless of manufacture or operator. This can create a real space for new renewable electricity production for electric car charging and, in addition, reduce the electricity grid both regionally and nationally. EV charging control can also create increased self-consumption of locally produced solar electricity. The project has contributed to increased focus on electric transport and solar energy in the municipality and at UiT and have resulted in one successful 15 MNOK project application (RENEW).

The project aims to collect data on electric vehicle charging infrastructure - connected to a city-scale photovoltaic power production, and quantify the potential use of EV batteries as storage for PV power production. Two system installations of PV EV-charging units both connected to the solar bank will be established in the project, one in Uppsala, Sweden and one in Tromsø, in northern Norway. Through modeling and data analysis, the proposed project will comparatively evaluate existing models in the expanding body of literature on theoretical approaches. The research conducted in Tromsø focuses on mapping solar energy resources and adapting PV technologies to cold climates. As such, the proposed project will, in addition to a demonstration of network of PV charging stations in an extreme climate, also addresses questions on how the proposed system will affect the distribution and use of solar energy in high latitudes. It also represents a possibility to evaluate this system in comparison with other related projects in Europe and globally. The data yielded in the proposed project can be used to evaluate grid impact for scenarios ranging up to fully electrified transportation in cities, and in the long run electrified transportation in entire nations and beyond.