Flexitricity to pool EVs in UK balancing market

UK power aggregator Flexitricity plans to trade power from more than 10,000 electric vehicles (EVs) in the UK's balancing market.

Flexitricity has announced a partnership with Ev.energy, a firm that offers smart charging services to EV owners.

Ev.energy's platform has more than 10,000 EV assets with a combined capacity of 60MW, which Flexitricity will be able to trade as a virtual lead party.

Without smart charging, most people would charge their EVs when they come home from work, when power demand is already peaking, the firms said. Ev.energy's customers instead set a time at which their cars must be charged by, and the firms' platforms will decide when to charge based on real-time price signals, including those from the balancing market. Shifting the charging time later takes pressure off the grid, while also reducing car owners' bills, the firms said.

The amount of EVs in the UK is increasing rapidly — almost a quarter of cars registered in the UK last month were electric, including plug-in hybrids, data from UK motor association SMMT show.

EV sales saw huge growth in 2020 despite a general slump in the market. Registrations of pure EVs rose to 108,205 in 2020, up by 186pc on the year. Their market share rose to 6.6pc, from just 1.6pc in 2019.

And the rise picked up steam at the end of the year — registrations rose by 343pc on the year to 21,914 in December 2020, taking a 16.5pc market share.

Registrations of plug-in hybrid cars climbed by 91pc on the year to 66,877 in 2020. Their market share was 4.1pc, from 1.5pc in 2019. And plug-in hybrids had a 6.9pc market share in December 2020, taking the combined market share last month to 23.4pc.

"More than 100 plug-in car models are now available to UK buyers, and manufacturers are scheduled to bring more than 35 to market in 2021 — more than the number of either petrol or diesel new models planned for the year", SMMT said.

Most EV registrations were for company cars in 2020, indicating there is further growth potential if private buyers receive stronger incentives to make the switch, SMMT said.

By Killian Staines