Denbighshire County Council has become one of the first organisations to have a radical new vehicle to grid (V2G) electric vehicle charger installed in its fleet depot using AC rather than DC current.

Martin Griffiths, fleet mobility lead officer at Denbighshire County Council

Trialled as part of the V2VNY (Vehicle 2 Volume eNergy Yield) project, the scheme explores how lower-cost V2G chargers using AC (alternating current) rather than DC (direct current) could help EV owners and fleets cut energy costs and improve the resilience of the UK’s electricity system.

The V2VNY project is being led by Hangar19, in partnership with CrowdCharge and DriveElectric. Other project partners are Electric Corby, Oxfordshire County Council, Grid Beyond and JLR. JLR is providing prototype electric vehicles for use in the trial.

Hangar19, one of the UK’s leading independent engineering companies in the EV supply equipment space, has developed a multi-socket AC bi-directional charger said to be the first on the market.

The vehicle to grid charging on the V2VNY trial is being simulated and optimised by AI technology from CrowdCharge, a company that has been running V2G in homes for over three years with effective results.

The project supports Denbighshire County Council’s existing work in the areas of sustainability, decarbonisation, energy and transitioning to electric. Its Fleet Services Centre has more than 400 vehicles, over 100 of which are EVs, including electric cars, vans, 16-seat minibuses, refuse collection trucks and even specialist off-road vehicles capable of operating in the local authority’s large expanse of countryside.

The depot generates its own electricity from solar panels linked to a battery storage system as part of a smart local energy system.

Martin Griffiths, fleet mobility lead officer at Denbighshire County Council, said: “Vehicle to grid charging, combined with a fleet of EVs, solar generation and battery storage, offers us the potential to reduce reliance on the grid even further, providing greater resilience if there was a problem with the UK’s electricity network. V2G is also expected to deliver savings on energy costs, as well as reducing carbon emissions.”

Denbighshire County Council is using a Kia EV6 electric car with vehicle to load (V2L) capability for the V2VNY V2G trial. Put to the test with a wide range of duties, the EV6 is said to have performed faultlessly, and as with the other EVs on the fleet, has resulted in huge savings in running costs compared to diesel vehicles. It has even used its V2L function to charge other EVs.

Councillor Barry Mellor, lead member for environment and transport, Denbighshire County Council, said: “As a council, we are working extremely hard to address the climate and nature emergency we declared in 2019. A vital part of this is reducing our own carbon footprint, with a big focus on the council fleet.

“We fully welcome the opportunity to have such an innovative system installed at our fleet depot and look forward to seeing its impact on conserving energy use at the site.”

Denbighshire County Council’s involvement in the V2VNY V2G trial has already attracted interest from other local authorities and the Welsh government. The project has also installed V2G charge points for other councils, including East Lothian, Islington, Oxfordshire and Wiltshire.

The trial aims to demonstrate a commercially viable way for fleet owners, businesses and EV drivers to save money and carbon, and for the UK to reduce the load on the electricity grid at peak times.

If an EV is charged when electricity prices are low and then it returns electricity back to the grid at peak times when prices are high, fleet operators can save on electricity costs. The V2VNY project is also trialling sending energy from EVs to buildings and to other vehicles as part of V2X (vehicle to everything).

Historically, V2G has only been possible with EVs featuring CHAdeMO (DC, or high power) charging technology, as featured on the Nissan Leaf. Virtually all of the latest EVs now use CCS (DC) charging technology rather than CHAdeMO. The V2VNY trial is harnessing AC bi-direction technology, which the charger synchronises with the grid. The AC solution is more efficient at low power and is therefore more suited for the use of V2G in a workplace or domestic setting, as well as meaning much lower costs for a charger.

V2G is seen by many industry experts as offering an important way to store energy generated by renewables and then to supply this back to the grid at peak times, to help reduce the UK’s reliance on fossil fuels and to accelerate progress to net zero. There are now over 1.4 million EVs on UK roads, with this figure growing every month, providing an ever-increasing quantity of mobile battery storage units.

The V2VNY Phase 2 project, part of the V2X Innovation Programme, is funded by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ), delivered by Innovate UK. The V2X Innovation Programme is part of the up to £65m Flexibility Innovation Programme, funded from the £1bn Net Zero Innovation Portfolio.