Northumberland Park in North London – one of the most significant electric bus facilities in Europe – has been transformed into a ‘virtual power station’ that generates electricity from parked busses. The government-funded project, called Bus2Grid, is a three-year trial of Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) technology. Energy firm SSE Enterprise will run the new low-emissions type of power station.
Bus2Grid is believed to be the largest V2G trial in the world. One hundred busses have been adapted for bi-directional charging. As many as 28 double-decker busses have been parked at the garage at a time since August 13, 2020, feeding electricity back to the grid.
The automated digital technology the busses plug into releases energy back to the grid when demand is high and recharges the vehicle when electricity demand is low. It helps to balance the grid’s peaks and troughs to make the network more efficient.
Niall Riddell, Smart Systems Innovation Sector Director for SSE Enterprise, said:
Central to the challenge of decarbonizing our transport and achieving climate change targets is how we can optimize the existing flexibility within the energy system. Developing a charging infrastructure that operates in two directions so that batteries can give back as well as take from the grid is an important part of this.
There are about 9,000 vehicles in the London bus fleet. If all of them were converted with V2G technology, it could meet the energy demands of over 150,000 homes.
Ian Cameron, Head of Innovation at UK Power Networks, said:
A fleet of bus batteries harnesses large amounts of electricity and they are habitual, with regular and predictable routes, driving patterns, and timings. That means we can easily predict and plan for how we can use any spare electrical capacity they can offer. For example, we could use them as energy storage devices that could add capacity and help us to increase the volume of renewable energy exported onto the network when supply might otherwise be exceeding demand. We believe buses have a big part to play in rolling out low emission vehicles. They offer huge opportunities to contribute to the drive to improve London’s air quality.
The organizations gathering data from the trial will focus on its social benefits, and commercial value, as well as carbon and energy impact. They will also explore the business case for V2G charging being implemented at scale in the bus industry, which means, how it can become a way for companies to make money by renting their fleet battery reserves to the grid.
Dr. Stephen Hall from the University of Leeds, one of the project partners, said:
Electrifying transport will have huge benefits for air quality in cities and for meeting our climate change commitments. Large electric vehicles like these can also support the energy system, but this means creating new ways of working between energy utilities, grid managers, and transport providers. This project is creating new business models to make this happen.
Frank Thorpe, Managing Director of BYD UK (Build Your Dreams), added:
Exploiting the potential of electric buses to act as ‘mobile power stations’ will be critical to the efficient running of the grid once electric vehicles of all types become commonplace.
UK Power Networks expects over 3.6m electric vehicles on the roads and connected to its network by 2030. That will create a significant additional demand for the energy system. The best option to meet this increasing demand is to charge more smartly.
Also, V2G would be an excellent reason to electrify school bus fleets. They can be charged during off-peak hours because of the nature of the school schedule, and they’re needed less in the summer when energy demands are at the highest.
