Plug-in Electric Vehicle Technology Overview

An overview of PEV technology from the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions.…

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Frontier battery development for hybrid vehicles

Background: Interest in hybrid-electric vehicles (HEVs) has recently spiked, partly due to an increasingly negative view toward the U.S. foreign oil dependency and environmental concerns. Though HEVs are becoming more common, they have a significant price premium over gasoline-powered vehicles. One of the primary drivers of this “hybrid premium” is the cost of the vehicles’ batteries. This paper focuses on these batteries used in hybrid vehicles, examines the types of batteries used for transportation applications and addresses some of the technological, environmental and political drivers in battery development and the deployment of HEVs.Methods: This paper examines the… View Full Resource

Certification Procedures for Advanced Technology Heavy-Duty Vehicles

Worldwide, commercial vehicles are the largest growing contributor to air pollution, fuel consumption, and global warming emissions in the on-road transportation sector. As with passenger vehicles, there are a variety of fuel, engine, and powertrain technology options for trucks and buses that can reduce criteria pollutant and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions compared with conventionally-powered diesel and gasoline vehicles. Examples of these advanced technologies include hybrid-electric, plug-in hybrid-electric, and hybrid hydraulic-powered drivetrains.…

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Economic Realities of the Electric Car

High gasoline prices and America’s alleged addiction to oil give rise to policy ideas to reduce America’s oil use, particularly in the transportation sector. Along with fuel efficiency standards and alternative fuel consumption mandates and production tax credits, the government has in place incentives to make and purchase electric cars, including hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), and battery electric vehicles (BEVs).

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Hybrid Electric Systems: Goals, Strategies, and Top Accomplishments

Transitioning America’s vehicle fleet to electric-drive vehicles could reduce U.S. foreign oil dependence by more than 60% and greenhouse gas emissions by 40% while increasing the nation’s economic security. But electric-drive vehicles aren’t new. At the start of the 20th Century, electric cars with lead-acid batteries held much of the U.S. market. Their popularity waned as the interest in cars with internal combustion engines (ICEs) rose, owing to the ICE vehicle’s longer driving range, declining petro- leum costs, and the advent of the electric starter and manufacturing assembly line.…

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Batteries for Electric Cars: Challenges, Opportunities, and the Outlook to 2020

What impact will the development and cost of various types of batteries have on the emerging market for electric cars? How much progress can we hope to see in the next decade, and what critical barriers will need to be overcome along the way?
The automotive industry’s quest to limit its impact on the environment and transform automotive mobility into a sustainable mode of transportation continues at high intensity, despite the current economic crisis. In an earlier report, we analyzed the technical and cost tradeo s of com- peting alternative power-train technologies. In this companion piece, we address the two …

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Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicle R&D Plan

FCVT (FreedomCar & Vehicle Technologies Program) in consultation with industry and other appropriate DOE offices developed this R&D plan to accelerate the development and deployment of technologies critical for plug-in hybrid vehicles. This plan addresses all aspects of R&D from technology assessment through production readiness.  The necessary development of batteries and electric drive components is described, including near- and mid-term R&D activities as well as long-term fundamental research.  It also relies on analytical studies to quantify the potential national benefits of PHEVS, and the monitoring of global policy and technological developments to find opportunities for beneficial collaboration and stay aware …

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Comparing the Benefits and Impacts of Hybrid Electric Vehicle Options

This reports summarizes results from the first-ever public domain multi-variant study comparing benefits and impacts of conventional vehicles and HEVs (gasoline-only and dual-fuel). It provides evidence that grid-connected hybrid electric vehicles are technologically feasible and can offer significant benefits.

This report indicates that HEVs, including grid-connected (plug-in) models, can probably be designed for a wide variety of vehicle platforms meeting performance characteristics customers are familiar with. Plug-in hybrids provide significantly improved fuel economy over conventional vehicles, reductions in greenhouse and smog precursor emissions, and petroleum use. However, HEVs, especially plug-in HEVs with an all-electric capability, cost more than conventional vehicles. …

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Coordinated Operation of Alternative Fuel Vehicle-Integrated Microgrid in a Coupled Power-Transportation Network

With the rapid development of alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs) and renewable energy sources, the increasing coordination between electric vehicles (EVs) and hydrogen vehicles (HVs) in urban coupled power-transportation networks (CPTNs) fosters optimized energy scheduling and enhanced system performance. This study proposes a two-level Stackelberg-Nash game framework for AFV-integrated microgrids in a CPTN to enhance the economic efficiency of microgrid. This framework employs a Stackelberg game model to define the leader-follower relationship between the microgrid operator and the vehicle-to-grid (V2G) aggregator. Nash equilibrium games are established to capture competitive interactions among charging stations (CSs) and among hydrogen refueling stations (HRSs). Furthermore, …

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China’s Urban EV Ultra-Fast Charging Distorts Regulated Price Signals and Elevates Risk to Grid Stability

The wide adoption of electric vehicles is driving the rapid deployment of ultra-fast charging stations, particularly in China. This study uses simulations based on extensive real-world charging data from major Chinese cities and finds that deploying 2000 ultra-fast charging stations in a city may increase the peak-to-valley differences of the public charging load by up to 31.61% daily relative to baseline cases. While integrating energy storage systems can help smooth short-term load volatility, it may simultaneously exacerbate short-term demand surges, particularly during the transition from high- to low-price periods. Under an unregulated scenario, large-scale deployment of ultra-fast charging stations with …

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