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Volkswagen Wants You to Use Your Electric Car to Help the Power Grid: Is It Worth It?

In 2020, Germany did not generate 6.2 TWh of green power for a simple reason: there was no demand for this energy when it was generated, and the country did not have any way to store it. Integrating electric cars into smart grids could provide the storage devices that are now necessary and Elli – a Volkswagen company – joined forces with Mitnetz Strom to study that.
Volkswagen studies integrating MEB vehicles into the power grid, but there are complications 6 photos
Photo: Volkswagen
Volkswagen studies integrating MEB vehicles into the power grid, but there are complicationsVolkswagen studies integrating MEB vehicles into the power grid, but there are complicationsVolkswagen studies integrating MEB vehicles into the power grid, but there are complicationsVolkswagen studies integrating MEB vehicles into the power grid, but there are complicationsVolkswagen studies integrating MEB vehicles into the power grid, but there are complications
The Volkswagen subsidiary and the regional distribution system operator from eastern Germany are developing a pilot program with around 20 vehicles from the ID family – ID.3, ID.4, and ID.5. The companies plan to create an algorithm that will offer price incentives to make it economically beneficial for these EV owners to use their cars as moving batteries.

Sadly, one thing that the companies did not mention was how that would work and how they plan to make it profitable for these electric car owners to use their battery packs to store green energy from solar and wind sources and give it back to the grid at peak consumption hours. With the current cell technology, it does not seem possible.

Most battery packs, including those in MEB vehicles, are made with ternary cells. These EV components are expensive (about $20,000 a piece for 100 kWh), and their lifespans are calculated based on cycles. In other words, how many times they can fully charge and discharge until they are no longer suitable for automotive use.

If this charge and discharge process also happens to make the grid stable, these EV owners will be left with a vehicle that will run fewer miles. Instead of discharging when moving, it will do so to give energy back to the grid. In other words, a cycle that would help make the electric car travel will be spent on powering other stuff.

In theory, that would be a great solution, allowing us to get rid of peaking power plants burning fossil fuels. In practice, all the burden is on the people who bought their electric cars and their battery packs. Ownership models in which EV buyers only pay for the cars but not for the battery packs could work if the automakers had a deal with grid operators.

Another possibility is to have such deals only for vehicles with different cells. Some LFP batteries, such as BYD’s Blade Battery, can have a lifespan of more than 1.2 million kilometers (745,645 miles). Solid-state cells may also have no issues with charging and discharging more frequently if they manage to make it into production.

At this point, the effort Elli and Mitnetz Strom are making may help us understand what it will take to make smart grids work. With this theoretical knowledge, all we will have to wait for are battery packs that won't cost $20,000 to replace or that are so reliable that won't be a concern. Grid operators may also choose to invest in massive battery packs. As long as they do not catch fire as the Victorian Big Battery did, it may be a more practical and dependable way to store green electricity.
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About the author: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo
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Motoring writer since 1998, Gustavo wants to write relevant stories about cars and their shift to a sustainable future.
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