DESCRIPTION

With the recent energy crisis looming over Europe reducing energy costs is a top priority for each household. With the least energy production capabilities in EU, Lithuania experienced the sharpest rise in prices compared to other countries. Soaring prices threaten electric vehicle transition as the costs of having an EV are becoming higher than having an internal combustion engine car.

PROBLEM

Typically, 80-90% of EV battery charges happen at home during the most expensive hours of the day – after work. Very few EV owners try to save energy costs by having a dynamic tariff and shifting charging session to the nighttime when the average costs are lower. Based on our pilot conducted in 2021 we found that the potential savings per month can be as high as 49,8% if car is charged at least 3 times per week, and up to 47.9% if EV is charged every day. Trying to manually save EV charging costs requires the right EV car model, time and effort which does not encourage EV transition.

SOLUTION

By partnering with Estonian startup Gridio, Ignitis innovation team kicked-off a pilot project of dynamic EV charging that was implemented in Ignitis EnergySmart mobile application. This functionality allows EV owners to capture the cheapest energy price hours in the market. Ignitis EnergySmart users need to directly integrate their EVs with the application, set the dynamic charging hours, place the market price cap, and hit dynamic charging button. This will effortlessly automate charging sessions during the cheapest hours and save money for EV charging sessions at home.  

STATUS AND PROGRESS

The functionality is live on the application and any Ignitis EnergySmart user with dynamic market tariff at home can use it with the following car models: Tesla, VW, Cupra, Audi, Hyundai, KIA, Škoda, Seat, BMW. As this is a first pilot project on EnergySmart application platform, we will keep adding new EV models in future so that more EV owners could utilize this simple way of energy saving.

Want to know more? Feel free to contact our Innovation expert Vincentas Vitkauskas – [email protected]