Design of a Coordinated Electric Vehicle Charging System to Flatten the Duck Curve

The augmentation of various photovoltaic systems in the power generation & distribution sector is surging in all countries. With the high penetration of solar energy, the daily energy demand profile is also going under a huge change. Due to the imbalance of solar generation & load demand, a specific type of demand curve is formed, conventionally known as Duck Curve. This results in decreasing the reliability of the whole power system & escalating its’ maintenance cost. There are many ways to reduce the effect of this deviation. In this paper, a coordinated charging system for large-scale electric vehicles is proposed using a fuzzy logic algorithm to flatten this duck curve. Various forecasted data are used in this study to evaluate the performance of the charging system. This system can reduce both the Start-Up Cost (SUC) of the dispatchable thermal units and the vehicle charging cost through Time of Use (ToU) based electricity pricing while increasing the reliability of the power grid. With successful implementation, this proposed system can be profitable for both the utility & the consumer.