Drivers of electric vehicles could save an average of £110 a year—and cut their carbon footprint by 20%—by using “smart charging” to power up their cars at the best possible times, a report by a research team involving Swansea University experts has shown.
Smart charging helps spread out demand for electricity to avoid overloading the National Grid. This is a major issue given the huge growth in the number of electric vehicles, with up to 11 million forecast to be on Britain’s roads by 2030.
Already people can get cheaper electricity by charging at certain times, usually in the early hours of the morning. But smart charging could go much further than this. For example, it could mean charging when windy weather means surplus wind power is being generated, or having your charging automatically coordinated with your neighbors.
I don’t know if it’s just me, but I think this electric car thing has some things in store that we may not know how to describe.