Potential for Plug-In Electric Vehicles to provide grid support services

Since the introduction of Plug-in Electric Vehicles (PEVs), scientists have proposed leveraging PEV battery packs as distributed energy resources for the electric grid. PEV charging can be controlled not only to provide energy for transportation but also to provide grid services and to facilitate the integration of renewable energy generation. With renewable generation increasing at an unprecedented rate, most of which is non-dispatchable and intermittent, the concept of using PEVs as controllable loads is appealing to electric utilities. If incentivized suitably, this could serve as an additional driver for PEV adoption. It has been widely proposed that PEVs can provide valuable grid services, such as load shifting to provide voltage and frequency regulation. The objective this work is to address the degree to which PEVs can provide grid services and mutually benefit the electric utilities, PEV owners, and auto manufacturers.