EV Respond

Project Summary

EV Respond will investigate methods to restore vulnerable customer supplies during a power cut, by making use of Electric Vehicles. The project will consider how this can be managed and coordinated by means of an app, will look at how connections can be carried out, and will consider the benefits/drawbacks when compared to the use of diesel generators.

• Problem(s)

  The supply of electricity is critically linked to health and wellbeing of energy consumers, with loss of supply having a severe impact on people’s lives, particularly those living in vulnerable circumstances and with certain health conditions. Current measures involve deployment of diesel generators which are costly to deploy, carbon-emitting and take up time of DNO resources; preventing them from fixing the underlying course.

• Innovation Justification

  Innovation: EV-Respond will provide a novel solution that utilises bidirectional charging technology combined with a digital solution to facilitate a community led, rapid response service that safeguards households with individuals who have a critical reliance on their electricity supplies. EV-Respond will also deliver innovation to enable networks to work with stakeholders and within communities to scale the solution’s impact. 

  Gaps in current work: The use of bidirectional charging has not been used, at scale, for restoration of vulnerable household’s energy supplies. There is also no solution that alerts people or organizations when a fault occurs and prioritises vulnerable customers so that a targeted response can occur.

  However, there are projects that have investigated alternative solutions to restore power during outages. The Discovery project shall incorporate learning from these projects.

  • Silent Power; this project is using vans with large batteries installed within them to help resupply community buildings as an alternative to diesel generators.
  • Security of Supply for Vulnerable Customers (SSVC); has been carrying out work to understand how small electric power stations could support vulnerable people during power outages.

  Value: The counterfactual solution uses diesel generators to resupply local substations whilst the network is fixed. EV-Respond would provide the following value in comparison:

  • Economic: The solution would be cost effective as would use assets (EVs) already existing in communities and fleets. It would be more targeted and quicker to deploy, enabling network staff to focus on addressing the underlying cause.
  • Sustainability: EVs are non-polluting, and the project would use assets already in existence (so better from resource consumption perspective). Being community led, much shorter distances would need to be travelled.
  •  Funding justification: This is a novel idea that sits outside BAU activity. Bidirectional technologies are emerging and there are complex technical challenges to resolve. Consumer engagement will be key, particularly given that the solution may be targeted towards vulnerable customers. The project may also trial utilizing NGED fleet vehicles to provide response services which would be a shift from the BAU status quo.
• Key Outputs and Learnings

  The EV Respond project explored a concept of utilising electric vehicles (EVs) with bi-directional charging capabilities to provide temporary power during prolonged outages. The Discovery Phase project delivered four work packages: Consumer Research, Technology Development, Software Integration, and Synthesis and Cost Benefit Analysis.

  The Consumer Research focused on identifying the risks and problems that power outages cause for Customers in Vulnerable Situations (CIVS). It revealed that power outages, likely to be exacerbated by climate change and an ageing population, pose significant issues for CIVS reliant on medical equipment, many of whom lack suitable backup power. Consulted CIVS expressed safety concerns regarding EV Respond and identified a preference for the service to be delivered by an organisation with appropriate technical and safeguarding training.

  Insights from stakeholder interviews confirmed an interest in the service. Individual EV owners expressed their willingness to serve as responders, while specialist electric freight organisations and commercial fleet operators recognised the value of larger EVs in power resupply, although stating that Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) is not currently available. The charity Motability indicated interest in the service with their existing customers, who already possess necessary EVs and charging equipment for their own EVs. A demographic analysis has shown that the potential customer base for EV Respond service was 113,479 households across NGED’s four licence areas, with the majority of them residing in rural areas. The analysis of potential EV responders has showed that there are ~34,000 Vehicle-to-everything (V2X) compatible vehicle across NGED’s four licence areas primarily concentrated in urban locations.

  Technology Development delved into the factors influencing the EV Respond operation, including policy, regulatory aspects, hardware, and processes. Resupplying entire homes using current hardware is not possible at the moment due to non-compliance withG99 Engineering Recommendation and safety concerns around islanding of homes and protection settings. Other solutions such as through a DNO-engineered temporary connection or Vehicle-to-Load (V2L) were considered.

  The Software Integration work package visualises a prototype of the app providing information and communication channels to customers, responders, and DNO operational staff, managed centrally by DNO Call Centre staff.

  Synthesis and Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) presented a business case for EV Respond. Comparing the costs of traditional Diesel Generators (DGs) with the projected costs of EV Respond, the analysis confirmed that EV Respond should be cost-effective. It should be noted that CBA is based on significant assumptions around compensation amount, speed of restoration, technology readiness and safeguarding compliance