The impact of vehicle-to-grid on the distribution grid

Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) can be connected to the power grid. The power flow of this connection can be bidirectional, so vehicles can charge and discharge. This vehicle-to-grid option can aid to improve grid efficiency and reliability. A simulation covering an entire day is essential to obtain an accurate assessment of the impact of PHEVs. It is important to know when, statistically, vehicles are available for charging or discharging. In this work is shown that uncoordinated charging of PHEVs in distribution grid can lead to local grid problems. Therefore, coordinated charging and discharging is investigated and a voltage constraint is implemented. These vehicles can support the grid in terms of voltage control and congestion management. In that way, the distribution grid can handle more PHEVs without reinforcements. Distributed generation units are more common nowadays in the distribution grid with some of these generation units based on intermittent renewable resources. This paper shows that there could be a good combination with PHEVs as they can provide storage to take care of the excess of produced energy and use it for driving or release it into the grid at a later time. In that way, consumption and generation are more efficiently matched. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.