UK companies EV.Energy and Flexitricity are working together so capacity in electric vehicles can help National Grid deal with outages or unexpected high demand.

They are using EV charging flexibility in National Grid’s short-term operating reserve (STOR) service for the first time.

The activity builds on and reinforces the UK’s work in opening up power markets to aggregated distributed energy resources. Unlike other similar activities, this participation in power reserve markets is not an innovation or pilot project, but part of business-as-usual commercial flexibility.

Flexitricity has included 500 EV.Energy users in its virtual power plant participating in the STOR service. National Grid calls on the STOR when demand is greater than expected or when generation capacity has gone offline unexpectedly. When this happens, Flexitricity will ask EV.Energy’s users to reduce their charging temporarily. EV.Energy’s smart charging platform will respond to the request while ensuring drivers have enough charge in their cars when they need it.

“Flexitricity is now the first organisation to participate with 500 EV charging points in STOR,” said Andy Lowe, CEO of Flexitricity (www.flexitricity.com). “This milestone marks another industry first and showcases Flexitricity’s commitment to innovation in the energy sector. By joining Flexitricity’s virtual power plant (VPP), more organisations can now contribute to GB’s largest VPP, which has recently surpassed the impressive 1GW milestone. This accomplishment not only highlights Flexitricity’s leadership in the industry but also opens up new opportunities for to be part of a more sustainable and efficient energy system.”

Nick Woolley, CEO at EV.Energy (www.ev.energy), added: “EV.Energy is participating as many EV drivers into grid services programmes as possible and is a leader for independent EV charging flexibility. We were one of the first and biggest providers of services to distribution system operators and our participation in STOR now highlights our continued leadership in the sector.”

This latest work fits into a larger effort to open up energy markets to more sources such as EV chargers, residential batteries and heat pumps to connect users with the power system, lower network costs and support the integration of more renewable energy.

British energy system operator National Grid ESO (www.nationalgrideso.com) is working on similar initiatives, such as a demand flexibility service and live balancing mechanism trial. Meanwhile, the UK’s distribution system operators have been tapping into resources to address local network issues.

The UK government’s Department of Energy Security & Net Zero and the British energy regulator Ofgem (www.ofgem.gov.uk) have helped lay the groundwork for these initiatives and encouraged new players to take part.

Looking to the future, this STOR involvement hints at more to come. New National Grid ESO flexibility services, Quick and Slow Reserve, should further unlock the potential of flexible EV charging, providing value to EV drivers and reducing costs for everyone connected to the grid.