According to a new study by researchers from Delft University of Technology, in the context of current recharging time, Dutch EV drivers in general prefer not to participate in “vehicle-to-grid” (V2G) contracts, while the opposite is true in the context of fast recharging.

With regard to specific V2G contract attributes, Dutch EV drivers are most concerned about discharging cycles. Also important is the guaranteed minimum battery level. The importance of that criterion drops significantly in the fast charging context. In addition, monthly remuneration and plug-in time also influence people’s preferences for adopting V2G.

An open-access paper on the study and implications for aggregators and policy makers is published in the journal Energy Policy. (The V2G contract is a contractual agreement between EV owners and an actor called the aggregator. The role of the aggregator is to coordinate V2G and participate in the market on behalf of EV owners.)

The goal of this paper is to (1) contribute to the literature on the adoption of V2G by exploring Dutch EV drivers’ preferences for participating in V2G contracts in terms of different contract attributes and (2) assess the impact of future battery technology (i.e. fast recharging) on the preferences for V2G contracts. For the first goal, we have conducted a stated choice experiment in which EV drivers were provided with various V2G contract schemes. To achieve the second goal, the experiment was designed as a context-dependent experiment. More specifically, the choice sets of the experiment were presented in two different contexts concerning EV recharging time: the current recharging time and fast recharging. Through this context-dependent experiment, we aim to explore the impact of EV recharging time on the general preference for V2G contracts and the interaction effect between EV recharging time and the guaranteed minimum battery level of the EV.

—Huang et al.

Data collection was conducted during late May to early July 2019 in the Netherlands. Respondents were approached at random at EV charging points with an invitation to fill out a paper-pencil survey or a flyer containing a link of the online version. The final sample contains 148 respondents.

Our results showed that the rates of “no V2G” being chosen dropped dramatically in the context of fast recharging, compared to the context of current recharging time. This implies that future technology development regarding EV recharging time is expected to facilitate the widespread adoption of V2G.

—Huang et al.

Resources

• Bing Huang, Aart Gerard Meijssen, Jan Anne Annema, Zofia Lukszo (2021) “Are electric vehicle drivers willing to participate in vehicle-to-grid contracts? A context-dependent stated choice experiment,” Energy Policy, Volume 156, doi: 10.1016/j.enpol.2021.112410