Electric vehicle charging during the day or at night: a perspective on carbon emissions
For policymakers and grid operators, this work provides a method to reduce carbon emissions from EV charging, though it is incremental as it applies existing optimization to a specific region.
The paper proposes an emission-oriented charging scheme for electric vehicles in the ERCOT region, achieving a 13.8% average reduction in carbon emissions during daytime charging compared to direct charging, with significant reductions on 30% of days per year.
We propose an emission-oriented charging scheme to evaluate the emissions of electric vehicle (EV) charging from the electricity sector at the region of Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT). We investigate both day- and night-charging scenarios combined with realistic system load demand under the emission-oriented vs direct charging schemes. Our emission-oriented charging scheme reduces carbon emissions in the day by 13.8% on average. We also find that emission-oriented charging results in a significant CO2 reduction in 30% of the days in a year compared with direct charging. Apart from offering a flat rebate for EV owners, our analysis reveals that certain policy incentives (e.g. pricing) regarding EV charging should be taken into account in order to reflect the benefits of emissions reduction that haven't been incorporated in the current market of electricity transactions.