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.

I. Introduction

California is a nation-wide leader in setting environmental goals to combat climate change. Senate Bill 32 requires a 40% economywide GHG reduction below the 1990 level by 2030. In 2020 Governor Newsom mandated that 100% of in-state sales of new passenger cars and trucks be zero emission by 2035. [1] California Air Resources Board (CARB) Advanced Clean Trucks and Advanced Clean Fleets regulations will advance the adoption of zero emissions medium- and heavy-duty vehicles. [2] Meeting these goals will require wholesale transformation of the economy [3] and novel solutions to barriers that arise during the transition. Electricity providers like SCE are at the forefront of identifying and meeting these requirements. One such barrier is lack of existng charging facilities at customer sites, resulting in a need for temporary and deployable electric vehicle (EV) charging for a variety of customer and internal charging use cases. This paper provides an introduction to one solution SCE is piloting along with a case study on its use for fleet charging.