The energy can be transferred to the energy grid, used immediately or stored in the battery of an electric car, to be used at some later time to drive the car or run household appliances. This pilot program was presented on May 13th, at the Smart City Event in Amsterdam.
Several partners are cooperating in the pilot: Cofely, Alliander, ABB, Mitsubishi Motors Corporation, Amsterdam Smart City, Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences and the borough of Nieuw-West. TKI Switch 2 Smart Grids provided a subsidy for the project, so that an investment of 1, 6 million euro will be available. The cooperating partners will provide support for three years, to tackle the various technical, economic and social impediments. This pilot will help move forward the large scale implementation of electric vehicles, the use of solar energy and the energetic independence of households.
Open Platform and residents’ research
In the pilot program, a system is tested to give residents control of their own energy supply. In the future, this can help to better balance the energy net. Residents could be given incentives to put up their cars as a storage unit of energy, or the opposite: to unload the stored energy in their batteries back to the grid. Students of the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences will study the behaviour of residents and chart their energy use. Another important part of the pilot is the development of an open online platform for data communication. This open platform connects several entities that normally would not automatically cooperate because of differences in communication protocols. Data from a household can be connected to data in a car battery, or a charge station. The data can be of use in creating new products and services for the end user, for instance by developing apps that arrange sustainable energy, electric vehicles or trading of energy between households.
In 2014, the Vehicle2Grid pilot will begin its three-year run. The program is divided into three stages:
- Vehicle2Home 2014, Lochem: A handful of selected enthusiastic households will perform the first tests, so the system and the data platform can be optimised.
- Vehicle2Building 2015, Amsterdam: The experience gained in Lochem is put to use in a second test situation, in which (company) cars and a handful of electric cars are connected.
- Vehicle2Grid 2016, Amsterdam: For part three, all garnered insights are collated in the last phase of the pilot. A whole street or neighbourhood in Nieuw-West will be connected.