ELECTRIC VEHICLE CHARGE
With artificial intelligence
Abstract
The project aims at developing an Electric Vehicle (EV) charging network management platform, incorporating a variety of features associated with the use/charging of EVs in a microgrid management context, for application in commercial/service buildings for intelligently schedule EVs charging.
DESCRIPTION
The European Union has been increasingly interested and concerned with energy policy in general. In the Clean Energy Package (2015 and 2019), citizens are at the centre of concerns and the need to be able to take advantage of new technologies to reduce energy bills and participate actively in the market is highlighted. One of the priorities is to "facilitate the participation of consumers (...) through smart grids …". The Green Deal, released in December 2019, sets out an approach for a deep transformation of the EU economy to a new growth strategy based on clean energy supply across all sectors, requiring the deployment of innovative technologies and infrastructure, such as smart grids.
The work proposed in this project aims to develop an Electric Vehicle (EV) charging network management platform that incorporates a large variety of features associated with the use and charging of EVs and building management in a microgrid context, for application in commercial/services buildings for automatically and smartly schedule EVs charging. The main innovation and objective of the platform to be developed in the scope of this project is to develop an adequate and intelligent automated power charging management of an EV fleet, increasing charging capacity without the need for electrical infrastructure upgrades. This power management is made, taking into consideration multiple inputs and parameters/restrictions acquired from different sources, in real-time, ensuring that the electrical building power demand is not exceeded. The platform intends to keep up with industry trends and prepare buildings for the future of electric transportation.
The preliminary list of data inputs and parameters/restrictions include: EV state of charge, energy storage, renewable energy production, building power demand, user/EV mobility behaviour and agenda, demand response strategies, V2B/B2V, routing, energy tariffs and scheduling. Based on all the multiple inputs, parameters, restrictions and other definitions, the platform will take decisions, based on computer intelligence algorithms to be developed, in order to manage the power and charging time of each charging point of an EV fleet, prioritizing them and performing an efficient use of the energy resources available on the building. The developed platform will be tested in a pilot demonstrator using the smart grid infrastructure that is already installed in the co-promoter facilities.
The “EVAI Charge” is a complete solution for a charging network management:
it includes hardware (EVSE, energy meters, demand response equipment) and software (user friendly interface and computer intelligent algorithms for automated energy resource management). It will be compatible with most of the market existing controllable EVSEs and demand response equipment's.
OBJECTIVES
As suggested by the acronym, EVAI Charge, the main objective of the project is the development of a platform for smartly charging EVs within a building context, based on Artificial Intelligence.
The project will address the following general objectives:
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Optimization of energy resources in buildings, increasing the matching between demand and local renewable generation;
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Minimization of EV charging costs and energy costs in buildings;
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Minimization of the power demand in the building;
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Implementation of demand response in buildings using other loads as flexibility option during the EV charging process;
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Contribute to the improvement of smart readiness levels of buildings with the integration of smart charging;
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Pilot demonstration implementation to evaluate the results of the proposed solutions both in terms of technical (integration of renewables, power demand, etc) and economic impacts (EV charging costs and energy costs in the building).
PILOT
“EVAI Charge” will be tested in a real-life environment on a pilot implementation. The pilot is going to be implemented in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of University of Coimbra. The building was constructed in 1996 and is composed of 9 floors, with a total area of about 10.000 m2 and electricity consumption of about 500 MWh/year.
The building comprises classrooms, offices, laboratories, administrative services, study rooms, bar, mechanical workshop and garage. Beyond the department teaching services, three research institutes associated with the University are located in the building. The pilot building is fitted with a 70kWp PV system, a nearly 30kWh energy storage system and several unidirectional/bidirectional EV chargers.
