EVs and ERCOT: Future Adoption Scenarios and Grid Implications

• Main Authors: Nelson, Kelsey, Moura, Pedro, Mohammadi, Javad
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 08-11-2022
• Subjects: Computer Science - Systems and Control
• DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2211.04391

Electric vehicles (EVs) are becoming more commonplace in Texas, mainly due to
their increasing attractiveness to consumers and pushes from the state's
governing bodies to incentivize further adoption. Meanwhile, service from
Texas's electric grid, ERCOT, has been seeing increases in power demand due to
a growing population, increased air conditioning use, and pushes for
electrification across other industries. The electrification of vehicles will
only add to this demand increase. This paper focuses on evaluating different EV
adoption, charging management, and policy scenarios, and how they will be
expected to impact ERCOT, particularly with respect to peak demand increases. A
strong increase in the peak demand can lead to challenges to keep the
electrical grid's reliability, making it an important consideration for
electrification in any sector. The anticipated impacts of EV adoption on peak
demand are quantified using ERCOT's data on past generation and planned
installations, the approximated effectiveness of EV incentives, EV charging
profiles, and travel patterns. The results showcase the fact that the
achievement of ambitious EV market share goals will be manageable on a
statewide level regarding electricity supply into 2030, but will eventually
necessitate ambitious charging management strategies in order to limit the EV
fleet's potentially heavy impact on peak demand looking forward into 2050 and
beyond.