Southern California Edison's Innovative Solutions to Accelerating Electric Transportation and Securing Charging Resiliency Across Vehicle Classes

Southern California Edison (SCE) worked under an initiative to develop and test a method for providing EV charging to its customers in the event of a power outage. The result was a multi-functional system which could charge multiple electric vehicles of all types at a high rate in a single or multiple locations using either non-emitting battery power systems, fuel cell power systems, clean engine generators, or temporary utility connections. These systems could also be left in place and used for the purpose of serving customers while grid upgrades are in process. In executing this work, SCE found, while simultaneously working to electrify its fleet of 6,000 vehicles, that the system could function in emergency-type applications envisioned when SCE will have to perform all the emergency and routine work performed today with diesel and gasoline vehicles with zero emission electric vehicles in the future. The study showed that SCE could deploy transportable heavy electric truck charging systems to unimproved sites and fuel those trucks with a zero-emission hydrogen fuel cell power system, bringing in a continuous supply of hydrogen to sustain critical fleet truck operations.