Electric Vehicles, Energy Storage, and Carbon Fibre

 

Peter Crone, speaking at a Community Energy event in Plymouth on 14th November described the potential of electric vehicles to provide energy storage. 

He claimed that there are 31.7 million cars in the UK, and that the average car travels 22 miles per day and spends 96% of its time parked. He asked the audience to consider the energy storage situation if the all these vehicles were electric, and their spare electrical capacity was made available to the grid. Taking the Nissan Leaf as an example, this would amount to 949 million kWh, close to the 978 million kWh average daily energy use in the UK. Thus the national fleet could store almost a day’s energy supply, offering a valuable balance against the intermittent nature of renewable sources and the fluctuating nature of hourly demand. Peter gave as an example the Western Isles Consolidated V2G and RE Study, which is described along with other related projects at

https://www.newpower.info/2018/02/vehicle-to-grid-projects-share-30-million-funding/

Subsequent discussion on electric vehicles included recent work on carbon fibre car bodies, which could allow the batteries to be an integral part of the load bearing structure, and the development of induction and other modes of charging, which could allow vehicles in motion to charge from power sources embedded in the road surface.

Some articles on carbon fibre structural batteries:


https://www.theengineer.co.uk/carbon-fibre-structural-battery/
https://www.sytner.co.uk/news/carbon-fibre-batteries/

Articles on charging EVs while driving:


https://www.engadget.com/2018/04/12/sweden-modified-road-recharge-electric-car-while-driving/
https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/electric-cars-charge-while-moving-60mph-france-scalextric-track-road-vehicles-battery-a7755261.html
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/electric-cars-charging-qualcomm




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