Thank you for visiting nature. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer.
In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript. Electric vehicles will contribute to emissions reductions in the United States, but their charging may challenge electricity grid operations. We present a data-driven, realistic model of charging demand that captures the diverse charging behaviours of future adopters in the US Western Interconnection.
We study charging control and infrastructure build-out as critical factors shaping charging load and evaluate grid impact under rapid electric vehicle adoption with a detailed economic dispatch model of generation. Locally optimized controls and high home charging can strain the grid. Shifting instead to uncontrolled, daytime charging can reduce storage requirements, excess non-fossil fuel generation, ramping and emissions.
Our results urge policymakers to reflect generation-level impacts in utility rates and deploy charging infrastructure that promotes a shift from home to daytime charging.
The use of electric vehicles EVs , coupled with an electricity grid that is decarbonizing, can help the United States achieve emissions reduction targets 1 , 2. Industry analysts forecast that the number of light-duty EVs and their charging plugs will multiply to over million and million, respectively, worldwide by , an order of magnitude increase when compared with 3. While the implications of transportation electrification for the grid have been studied at low, near-term levels of adoption, identifying and mitigating system consequences at deep levels of EV adoption has remained a critical challenge as it requires models that capture the diverse behaviours and conditions of future drivers Driver behaviour is highly heterogeneous and stochastic 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 ; where, when and how often drivers choose to plug-in determines their load shape and demand on the grid.
