Publication
Increasing Grid Visibility on the Basis of Smart Meters as a Building Block for Grid Integration of Electromobility
Schaugar Azad; Evgeny Schnittmann; Markus Zdrallek; Christian Breuer; Julian Zimpel; Marcus Hörhammer; Alexander Schalk; Nils Neusel-Lange; Boris Brandherm; Matthieu Deru; Alassane Ndiaye
In: 3rd E-Mobility Integration Symposium (E-Mobility) Dublin, Ireland. E-Mobility Integration Symposium (E-Mobility-2019), October 14, Dublin, Ireland, Energynautics GmbH, Germany, 10/2019.
Abstract
The transformation of the traffic sector initiated by the German federal government has an increasing influence on the structures and supply tasks in today's distribution grids. Due to the small number of electric vehicles, the effects are currently not widespread. According to the Federal Motor Transport Authority, a total of 47.1 million passenger cars were registered in Germany by 1 January 2019. Of these, 83,175 were electric vehicles - an increase of 54.4% compared to the previous year.
Today, local grid bottlenecks are already occurring, for example where a large number of charging points are bundled together, such as in car parks or modern residential areas. Intelligent charging management can ensure that as many charging points as possible are served and that the power supply to the connected apartments and commercial units is guaranteed at the same time. The solution comes from a single source and coordinated hardware and the software components are even compatible with each other because they were already coordinated in the planning phase. In such projects, the charging points in the parking areas are linked to a central control system via a network, as the distances are comparatively short. In addition, the hardware of a single manufacturer is usually used in such projects. Communication with the grid operator is not necessary as decentralized control is used.
In contrast, various components from different manufacturers are often already installed in public areas and the distribution grid is already in existence and may have to be enhanced. In addition, decentralized power generation plants can lead to internal overload situations which are not detected by the traditional network protection equipment installed in the local grid transformer (in contrast to residential areas). In addition, classical local grids often lacks spatial proximity and the present charging infrastructure is not homogenous. The preconditions for interconnecting the different charging infrastructures are standardized communication protocols and an interface to the distribution grid operator.
In this contribution, the University of Wuppertal, together with its partners DFKI, SPIE, STEAG, Voltaris and the VSE all partners of the SINTEG showcase project DESIGNETZ, shows how the combination of smart meters and decentralized distribution grid automation systems can increase visibility in the grid cost-effectively in order to enable an integrated charging infrastructure in the distribution grid. In this context, an intelligent Smart Meter Converter is presented, which provides the decentralized grid automation system with scenario-specific Smart Meter data in a usable form. An overriding objective of the paper is to show how smart meters can be applied to improve measuring and responses to the impacts of e-mobility.