Electric vehicles can charge to the rescue in blackouts

Electric vehicles could provide a lifeline for the electricity grid in times of crisis, going by a world-first Australian trial in which EVs immediately discharged their batteries in response to a network failure in which storms cut power to half a million homes.

Victoria’s power supply was thrown into chaos in February when toppled transmission towers at Anakie, west of Geelong, cut power to 530,000 homes. But the event was a perfect opportunity to demonstrate the untapped resources under the bonnet of hundreds of thousands of cars across the country.

Electric vehicles charging in Canberra as part of ANU’s Realising Electric Vehicle-to-Grid Services trial.

When the transmission lines fell, 16 electric vehicles in a trial located 520 kilometres away in Canberra, as the crow flies, detected the disruption and within seconds pumped power back into the grid.

The trial tested what is known as vehicle-to-grid technology, in which devices fitted to EVs can detect small variations in the frequency of the grid that could be disruptions to power supply hundreds of kilometres away.

Conducted by the Australian National University’s battery storage and grid program, the trial supplied only 107 kilowatts of power – a negligible amount compared with national electricity demand.

But according to lead researcher Dr Bjorn Sturmberg, the results show the tantalising potential of EVs to firm up supply.

The trial, called the Realising Electric Vehicle-to-Grid Services trial, is the first in the world to test EV response to sudden drops in power supply.

“The event in February was the first real-world test of our vehicles and chargers. We now know a vehicle-to-grid system can work,” Sturmberg said. “They’re essentially big batteries on wheels.”

Electricity retailers have previously conducted trials to take advantage of market movements, with vehicles discharging their batteries when power prices are high and charging when prices are low.

Power lines came down in the You Yangs, near Geelong in Victoria, following windy and stormy weather in February.Credit: Jason South

“It’s a world first, in the sense that there’s not ever been a vehicle trial to respond so quickly to an emergency,” Sturmberg said.

EVs could play a huge role in the future electricity grid.

For NSW and the ACT, the Australian Energy Market Operator has contracted about 700 megawatts of emergency reserves, which is equivalent to the combined power supply in 105,000 EVs, Sturmberg said.

Emergency reserves are contracted by the electricity market operator from operators of generators such as big batteries and gas plants, so instantaneous power can be jolted into the grid in case of a power line collapse or other emergency.

“To put that in perspective,” Sturmberg said, “105,000 vehicles responding in this way would fully cover the back-up required for the whole of ACT and NSW”.

He said vehicle-to-grid technology would not only provide the grid with an extra power supply, it could also be used to cut demand when power supplies were running low.

The February power line collapse in Victoria not only cut supply to hundreds of thousands of homes, it sent a shock into the grid that effectively tripped a fuse connecting the grid to the massive Loy Yang A brown coal plant 240 kilometres to the east of Melbourne.

The loss of this coal plant prompted the energy market operator to trigger what’s known as load shedding – intentionally cutting power supply to about 90,000 homes to preserve stability in the grid.

“Stopping just 6000 vehicles charging would have kept the power on for those 90,000 customers whose power was cut on February 13,” Sturmberg said.

Carmakers could be required to fit their vehicles with technology that can respond to demand for power supply.

“It may call for an industry adjustment, for instance, to require EV manufacturers to program their vehicles to stop charging during a grid emergency, with an option for drivers to override for urgent charging,” Sturmberg said.

The federal government has not set a target for electric vehicle sales, but NSW, Victoria and Queensland have set targets for EVs to reach 50 per cent of new car sales by 2030 and 100 per cent by 2035.

The number of EVs has risen rapidly to exceed 8 per cent of new cars sold in 2023, up from just 3 per cent in 2022. On the current trajectory, EVs would reach 50 per cent of new car sales by 2033.

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