NREL study quantifies non-residential charging infrastructure needs for growing fleet of plug-in electric vehicles

My Nissan Leaf Forum

Help Support My Nissan Leaf Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

GRA

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 19, 2011
Messages
14,018
Location
East side of San Francisco Bay
Via GCC: http://www.greencarcongress.com/2017/10/20171040-nrel.html

A new study from the US Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) quantifies how much charging infrastructure would be needed in the United States to support various market growth scenarios for plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs). Under the study’s central scenario (15 million PEVs in 2030), the US would need 8,500 direct current fast charging (DCFC) stations with 27,500 plugs in total, plus 601,000 non-residential Level 2 charging plugs to meet projected demand.

Sales of PEVs—plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and battery-electric vehicles (EVs)—have surged recently. Most PEV charging occurs at home, but widespread PEV adoption would require the development of a national network of non-residential charging stations. Strategically installing these stations early would maximize their economic viability while enabling efficient network growth as the PEV market matures.

The analysis found that communities will have significantly larger charging infrastructure requirements than Interstate corridors. . . .

The results suggest that a few hundred corridor fast-charging stations could enable long-distance EV travel between US cities. Although many of these early-market stations could be underutilized at first, NREL’s analysis of driving patterns and vehicle characteristics suggests how corridors could be prioritized and station spacing set to enhance station utility and economics.

Compared to interstate corridors, urban and rural communities are expected to have significantly larger charging infrastructure needs. About 8,000 fast-charging stations would be needed to provide a minimum level of urban and rural coverage nationwide. In a PEV market with 15 million vehicles, the total number of non-residential charging outlets or “plugs” needed to meet urban and rural demand ranges from around 100,000 to more than 1.2 million.

Understanding what drives this large range in capacity is critical. For example, whether consumers prefer long-range or short-range PEVs has a larger effect on plug needs than does the total number of PEVs on the road. The relative success of PHEVs versus EVs also has a major impact, as does the number of PHEVs that charge away from home. . . .
There's a chart. Direct link to the study (74 pages):
National Plug-In Electric Vehicle
Infrastructure Analysis
https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/69031.pdf
 
Funny, I was just talking about this with my wife.
Since I think the overwhelming number of EVs on the road in just a few years will have 200+ miles of range I expect destination charging to rapidly recede in importance.

Face it, folks. Our 40 - 60 Ahr packs are city cars, and it makes little sense to invest in infrastructure to make them a little bit more.
As for PHEVs, the presumption in the article that these owners will seek out expensive charging for the small fraction of their overall miles is misplaced. Why expensive ? Because of the density of L2 EVSE required to avoid inconvenience -- and we KNOW what Americans think of inconvenience.
 
SageBrush said:
Funny, I was just talking about this with my wife.
Since I think the overwhelming number of EVs on the road in just a few years will have 200+ miles of range I expect destination charging to rapidly recede in importance.

Face it, folks. Our 40 - 60 Ahr packs are city cars, and it makes little sense to invest in infrastructure to make them a little bit more.
As for PHEVs, the presumption in the article that these owners will seek out expensive charging for the small fraction of their overall miles is misplaced. Why expensive ? Because of the density of L2 EVSE required to avoid inconvenience -- and we KNOW what Americans think of inconvenience.

The study examines hi-lo/base case scenarios, and considers the effects of various hi/lo mixes including 20 and 50 mile PHEVs, 100 and 250 mile BEVs, and 20 mile PHEV SUVs and 250 mile BEV SUVs; cities (486, 50k+ pop, 71% of U.S. pop..), towns (3,087, 2.5-50k,10% of U.S. pop. ) rural (19% of pop.), and interstate corridors (28,530 miles).

While this work is not intended to forecast future PEV markets, scenarios are developed to exercise the
infrastructure estimation methodology and highlight sensitivities. The analysis assigns no probabilities to any
PEV market or technology scenarios and considers none of the scenarios as most likely. However, a central
scenario is established from which individual elements of the modeling framework are studied using
parametric sensitivity analysis as shown in Table ES-1. The central scenario and bounds on the accompanying
sensitivities have been developed using a combination of existing PEV market/technology data and
engineering judgement to represent a set of scenarios that are illustrative of the role that key variables play in
dictating PEV infrastructure requirements. The goal of this scenario development is to estimate the magnitude
of PEV infrastructure requirements (relative to a growing national fleet of PEVs) and to highlight
dependencies with consumer preferences and technology development. . . .

Perhaps surprisingly, the national PEV total is not the most sensitive input parameter in this analysis; PEV
electric range, commitment to maximizing PHEV eVMT, and percent of charging taking place at home have
the largest effects. For instance, assuming a PEV market composed entirely of PHEV50s (PHEVs with a range
of 50 miles) and BEV250s (BEVs with a range of 250 miles) (the long range preference scenario) drops nonresidential
L2 requirements to approximately 338,000 plugs and public DCFC to 8,400 plugs. The sensitivity
on PHEV support reveals that non-residential L2 charging is modeled almost exclusively as supporting
PHEVs, where providing full support (maximizing eVMT for all PHEV owners) results in over 1,100,000
plugs, and providing no PHEV support drops the non-residential L2 plug requirement to under 63,000. Finally,
the sensitivity analysis on home charging demonstrates a strong relationship between home charging
utilization and non-residential infrastructure requirements. Specifically, a decrease in the amount of charging
happening at residential locations from 88% in the central scenario to 82% results in charging requirements
increasing to 1,100,000 non-residential L2 EVSE plugs and over 65,000 public DCFC plugs.
For a list of all the variables considered, see
Table ES-1. PEV Market Conditions for the Central Scenario and Sensitivities Explored
on page vi of the executive summary.
 
You missed the part where the article presumes maximum EV miles in a PHEV and where they acknowledge that this presumption drives the lion's share of L2 demand.
 
SageBrush said:
You missed the part where the article presumes maximum EV miles in a PHEV and where they acknowledge that this presumption drives the lion's share of L2 demand.
Didn't miss it., just didn't feel like mentioning every single variable. Anyone interested could read it for themselves, and the idea that PHEVs would use the maximum possible EV miles if they had the convenient option of doing so seems pretty intuitive, at least if they're paying for the privilege, the price is less than gas and the EV range is enough to matter; they also look at sensitivity to maximising eVMT when estimating how the number changes:
Perhaps surprisingly, the national PEV total is not the most sensitive input parameter in this analysis; PEV
electric range, commitment to maximizing PHEV eVMT, and percent of charging taking place at home have
the largest effects. For instance, assuming a PEV market composed entirely of PHEV50s (PHEVs with a range
of 50 miles) and BEV250s (BEVs with a range of 250 miles) (the long range preference scenario) drops nonresidential
L2 requirements to approximately 338,000 plugs and public DCFC to 8,400 plugs. The sensitivity
on PHEV support reveals that non-residential L2 charging is modeled almost exclusively as supporting
PHEVs, where providing full support (maximizing eVMT for all PHEV owners) results in over 1,100,000
plugs, and providing no PHEV support drops the non-residential L2 plug requirement to under 63,000. Finally,
the sensitivity analysis on home charging demonstrates a strong relationship between home charging
utilization and non-residential infrastructure requirements. Specifically, a decrease in the amount of charging
happening at residential locations from 88% in the central scenario to 82% results in charging requirements
increasing to 1,100,000 non-residential L2 EVSE plugs and over 65,000 public DCFC plugs.
Now, if the AER is really small many people won't bother to plug-in to maximise eVMT; I think the PiP represents that case, but all the PHEVs now being sold have AERs at least in the low double digits, and the larger the AER the greater the likelihood of people trying to maximise their eVMT. After all, that's what they're paying extra for. I happen to think that 20+ miles AER costs enough extra that most owners would want to plug in whenever they could conveniently do so.

Urban QCs, OTOH, are meant for emergency use for those who didn't charge their BEVs on L2 overnight for any reason.
 
Back
Top