Many Electric Vehicle users have solar PV roof panels already , or consider installing them. Since the price of panels recently reduced to around £55 each this is good news for anyone wanting to generate their own electricity both for the home and their vehicle too.
The electricity collected from solar roof panels is DC which is then converted to AC to run the home and home vehicle charger. Your car however, then needs to convert it back to DC to charge the vehicle traction battery. This conversion results in a loss of 13%, that might not sound like a lot, but when you consider that in a wet summer your electricity production can drop by 20 % before solar kicks in again when it stops raining. The direct solution would be to fit a DC charger to your home for your vehicle so that the conversion doesn't need to take place, avoiding the loss. This could be the difference between running off of free renewable energy or taking energy from the grid for your commute which costs money and loads the grid.
The early electric vehicles did actually run off a household DC apparatus via the Edison power system. But after the 'Current War' between Tesla and Edison The world changed to the AC, which we now have in our homes today.
Entelignet, a California based developer of smart solar power optimisation and solar EV charging technologies has picked up this issue. You can find out about this project and their other work on their website.https://enteligent.com/ They are the only company currently producing a home DC charger, but this promises to be a great solution not just for domestic vehicle charging but for vehicle fleets too.
A large rooftop array with PV panels, now being cheaper than tiles, companies would be able to rapid charge their fleet of vehicles just from daylight. The impact this could have on company profitability in the future is astonishingly good, giving hope to those businesses struggling with rising vehicle costs and shrinking profits. There are some other big benefits too such as cleaner air, reducing environmental impact and better inner city access for electric vehicles too.
In nearby Stoke-on-Trent there are many nationwide distribution companies, the lower cost of warehousing space, and easy motorway access, makes it the perfect spot for the fleets of small vehicles delivering to our doors. How much better would it be for everyone if this was lower cost and lower emissions - we'll watch this development with interest.
Note from the Editor: If you are considering solar PV roof panels or adding electric vehicles charging to your home or fleet, contacting local company and sponsor of COGNEWS Charlesworth Energy Ltd is a great place to start.
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