electric vehicles_technical briefing research

Chien-Cheng Lai - ID 665452

The Faculty of Engineering The University of Melbourne

Technical Research Briefing Paper Electric Vehicles Charging Infrastructure

ENGR90021 Engineering Practice and Communication Technical Research Briefing Paper

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Table of Contents

Executive Summary ......................................................................................... 3

1. Introduction ................................................................................................ 5

2. Optimal geographic location of charging points ......................................... 6 2.1. The p-median location model ........................................................................ 6 2.2. The flow-capturing location model ................................................................ 7 2.3. The flow-refueling location model ................................................................. 7

3. The user behavior of EVs .......................................................................... 9

4. Technology of infrastructure charging stations ........................................ 11 4.1. Types of the charging station ...................................................................... 11 4.2. The cost of electricity .................................................................................. 12

5. Conclusion ............................................................................................... 14

6. References .............................................................................................. 15


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Figure List Figure 1 The p-median model .......................................................................... 6

Figure 2 The flow-capturing location model ..................................................... 7

Figure 3 Definition of EV trips, return trips and tours ....................................... 9

Figure 4 Fuel costs of vehicle types .............................................................. 13

Figure 5 Comparison between electricity and petrol fuel cost in US ............. 13

Table List Table 1 Suitable cities and suburbs for charging infrastructure ....................... 8

Table 2 the Average travel distance by cars in VIC, NSW and QLD ............ 10

Table 3 The Levels of charging stations ........................................................ 12


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Executive Summary

Petrol vehicles are not only increasing emissions of greenhouse gases but

also producing pollutions directly to the environment. Hence, we introduce the

Electric Vehicles (EVs) in Australia with less negative effect on the

environment. However, Australian consumers only purchased 1015 EVs in

2014. This was caused by the lack of recharging infrastructure and merely

51 public EV charging stations are established in Australia. The report

provides the research and analysis of charging infrastructure, which is divided

into three aspects:

• The optimal geographic recharging locations

• The user behavior of EVs

• Technology of charging points

Three locations models are used to determine the minimal distance travelled

by users. The research shows that the p-median model is suitable for home

EV users. The flow-capturing model is used to deploy charging points at

roadsides or near to highways. The flow-refueling location model can

implement the deployment of charging stations in metropolitan areas.

In the user behavior of EVs, a single trip is defined as short distance within 20

kilometers while a journey is regarded as long distance large than 40

kilometers over multiple destinations. Therefore, The users tend to recharge

EVs at home for a trip and use outside charging stations for a journey.

As for technology of charging stations, it consists of three types of the

charging station and costs of electricity. The level 1 station is for a standard

home 220-volt outlet. The Level 2 is the normal charging points on the

roadside. The Level 3 is high-powered super charger, which can fully charge

within 40 minutes. In addition, electricity has the lowest fuel costs with only

0.04 AUD per kilometer while gasoline costs as high as 0.16 AUD per

kilometer.


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Finally, we provide viable recommendations for EV industries and the

Australian government as following:

• Conducting location models for deployment of charging stations

• Increasing the level 2 stations at shopping centers and working areas

• Deploying the level 3 stations in suburbs for long distance drivers

• Proposing a battery-swap method at charging stations

Similarly, Australian government can provide investment allowance to assist

charging infrastructure providers.


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1. Introduction

With the awareness of greenhouse gas emissions caused by carbon dioxide,

eco-friendly ways to save our environment have become a pressing issue

around the world. According to the search of the United Nations (2014),

traditional fuel cars produce approximately 20% CO! of the total amount

annually throughout the world. The fuel vehicle with the conventional

combustion engine not only produces a great deal of CO! but also releases

pollutants in the air. They contribute to upper respiratory problems and may

lead to lung damage of humans. Therefore, to eliminate greenhouse gas

emissions and air pollution from fuel vehicles, Electric Vehicles (EVs) are

regarded as green alternatives and introduced with little CO! emission and no

wastes gases and exhaust fumes.

Tesla is an American leading EV manufacturer that takes a great effort to

expand the usage of EVs. According to the research at the University of

Western Australia (2012), EVs can contribute to the transformation of

transport cars in Australia. However, EVs are still not popularized and only

1015 EVs sold in Australia last year according to statistics of the Australian

Electric Vehicle Association (2015). It is believed that the lack of

infrastructure charging stations in Australia becomes major challenge. If the

issue can be solved, it could give EVs a distinct advantage in the Australian

market place.


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The research of recharging infrastructure is comprised of three perspectives:

the optimal geographic location of charging points, the user behavior of EVs

and technology of charging stations.

2. Optimal geographic location of charging points

The charging stations is the major determinant in the Australian EVs

marketplace and the determined locations depend on a range of the factors:

the driving distance of EVs between charging points, the availability of

recharging stations at parking lots, typical driving distances by EVs user

during a day and availability of suitable sites for charging points (Speidel et

al., 2012).

Therefore, location models are introduced to determine optimal sites for the

deployment of charging stations. They are based on minimization of distance

travelled by users to the location and divided into three models: the p-median,

flow-capturing flow-refueling location models.

2.1. The p-median location model The p-median location model searches for p facilities for the sum of the

distances travelled by each user to the facility that is the minimized distance

illustrated in Figure 1.

Figure 1 The p-median model (Speidel et al., 2012)


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The p-median model is based on home locations, which are suitable for

deployment of charging points in residential areas (Speidel et al., 2012).

2.2. The flow-capturing location model The flow-capturing location model identifies the travel routes of EV trips to

maximize the number of routes by charging stations shown in Figure 2. The

capturing model is used for the most heavily trafficked routes, so it is well-

suited to deploy the charging infrastructure close to the highway or roadside

(Speidel et al., 2012).

Figure 2 The flow-capturing location model (Speidel et al., 2012)

2.3. The flow-refueling location model The flow-refueling location model only takes a route service into

consideration if a vehicle has sufficient fuel or electricity to travel between

successive stations. This model is suitable for the deployment of charging

stations at both statewide and metropolitan areas (McPherson et al., 2011).

According to the research by Sparking an Electric Vehicle Debate in Australia

(2013), there are demographic and geographic factors related to EV

ownership. Demographic factors comprise household income and education

levels. There are four basic measurement criteria: the household weekly

income is over 1052 AUD, at least one family member with a bachelor degree

or higher, households with broadband Internet access and more than two


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vehicles. If the household meets one of the above criteria, then they are more

likely to purchase an EV.

Moreover, Geographic factors such as capital cities and suburbs may be

suitable for the deployment of charging infrastructure. The assessment of

criteria includes the distance from CBD and proportion of separate houses.

Based on these two factors, the most probable charging stations in each

capital city and suburbs are shown in Table 1. It is also illustrates that they

are populated areas in Australia.

Table 1 Suitable cities and suburbs for charging infrastructure (ESAA, 2013)


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3. The user behavior of EVs

The driver’s behavior consists of trips and tours. Trips are defined as a short-

travelled distance within 10 kilometers as a single trip and 20 kilometers as a

round trip. Tours are viewed as long distance large than 40 kilometers over

multiple destinations shown in Figure 3. The EVs are expected to be

recharged for the trips at home or residential charging stations. On the other

hand, the tours are considered to rely on outdoor charging infrastructure

(Ashtari et al., 2012).

There is a comparison of tours and trips from family travel surveys in Victoria,

New South Wales and Queensland illustrated that the average of typical

commuter distance every day shown in Table 2.

Figure 3 Definition of EV trips, return trips and tours (Ashtari et al., 2012)


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Table 2 the Average travel distance by cars in VIC, NSW and QLD (Ashtari et al., 2012)

The daily vehicle tour information can be used to determine the prediction of

infrastructure layouts in East Australia.

In Western America, electric chagrining stations proliferate and become a

profound change in user behavior. Many of them are available to use and can

be found at places such as malls, shopping centers, grocery stores,

warehouses and parking lots. These charging points were accurately

deployed based on user behavior of travelling distances (Nordelof et al.,

2014) .


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4. Technology of infrastructure charging stations

Long charging time shows another technical challenge and business barrier.

The typical EVs can travel 200 kilometers with a single charge. With at-home

charging facility, it takes almost ten hours to fully charge by a standard home

220-volt outlet. If an EV driver stop in one site for an extended period such as

at the parking lots of the workplace during a day, a charging period of several

hours is acceptable. If EV users need to travel further than 200 kilometers,

the EV is required to recharging on the way. Nevertheless, during the

continuous journeys over multiple destinations, long charging time becomes

infeasible. Furthermore, the typical fuel car drivers get accustomed to

refueling occasionally, so it is difficult to treat a vehicle as a mobile phone,

which has to recharge it every day (Richard, 2011).

Presently, there are very few public charging infrastructure in Australian

metropolitan areas, meaning it is an major disadvantage for consumers to

charge their EVs outside instead of at home. The Australian public recharging

company, Chargepoint, currently provides 51 public charging stations

throughout Australia while there are 6444 charging points in total across the

USA (Smith et al., 2011).

4.1. Types of the charging station There are three levels of EV recharging stations. The level 1 charging point is

the conventional power point from a standard wall outlet and takes overnight

around 8 to 10 hours for being fully charged. It defines 5 to 10 kilometers of

range per hour of charging. The level 2 recharging station is the dedicated

inverter from 15 to 25 kilometers of per hour charging and requires EV supply

equipment to be hard wired into electricity supply of a building. The level 3

charging infrastructure is regarded as the Direct Current (DC) fast charging

system up to 100 kilometers in 20 minutes with the high voltage and amp but

it requires the extra enhanced cooling system shown in Table 2 (Smith et al.,

2011).


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Table 3 The Levels of charging stations (Smith et al., 2011)

The level 2 charging stations currently cost 1,000 USD to establish a single

station whereas the expenditure of a single Level 3 fast charger varies

between 20,000 to 50,000 USD based on the location. An Australian

company, Tritium has developed the level 3 recharging infrastructure to allow

EV customers to travel 50 kilometers by chagrining in just10 minutes (Richard,

2011).

According to Dunstan et al. (2011), over 81% respondents of Australian

vehicle users expected the EV to recharge within two hours and 23%

participants cited 30 minutes as the longest acceptable charging time.

Without the investment of charging infrastructure, the EVs are difficult to enter

Australian markets.

4.2. The cost of electricity Different types of vehicles produce various fuel costs per kilometer illustrated

in figure 4. The Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) is known as the petrol

vehicle that has the highest fuel costs with 0.16 AUD per kilometer of all

types of cars. The average running cost of the plug-in hybrid electric

vehicle (PHEV) and Hybrid is between 0.10 to 0.11 AUD per kilometer. On

the other hand, the battery EVs cost the lowest fuel costs with only 0.04 AUD

per kilometer (Mader, 2012).


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Figure 4 Fuel costs of vehicle types (Mader, 2012)

Moreover, the US Department of Energy calculated the fuel costs between

electricity and gasoline from 2001 to 2013 shown in Figure 5. It indicates that

the electricity price has not only been much cheaper than petrol since 2001,

but it also been far stable over the same period. Although Australian

electricity prices are approximately 55% higher than in America, it still gives

consumers a signal of the fuel saving available with the EVs compared to

petrol costs of 50% higher than in US. To increase the usage of EVs,

Western Australia provide currently offers free public charging points and

lower electricity rate for the EV users at non-peak times (Speidel et al., 2012).

Figure 5 Comparison between electricity and petrol fuel cost in US (Nordelof et al., 2014)


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5. Conclusion

We view EVs as the best solution to reduce CO! and pollutants in transport.

Although the charging system can be used at home, a vital hurdle is the

ability to make a long continuous journey similar to fuel vehicles.

Nevertheless, the lack of recharging infrastructure becomes a major issue of

introducing EVs into Australia.

Therefore, we propose the recommendations to deal with the problem. To

optimize geographic location of charging points, three types of location

models can be used to implement the deployment of number of chagrining

points in the residential, roadside and metropolitan areas.

In the same way, Australian government can also provide incentives such as

investment allowance to support charging infrastructure providers. In the user

behavior of EVs, the level 2 charging points are suitable for parking lots at

shopping centers and offices. The drivers tend to park their EVs for a long

time at the areas.

In technology of charging stations, the level 3 chargers also known as high-

powered supercharger stations that take less than 40 minutes for a full

charge can be deployed every 170 kilometers in suburbs or beside the

highway near to petrol stations for long-distance EV travellers. In addition,

the EV drivers can use in-car GPS and Apps to search for charging points.

Furthermore, we believe the battery-swap is another solution that batteries

can be quickly removed and replaced, enabling the EV drivers to continue

their journeys in minutes instead of hours for long waiting. This method can

be placed at the recharging infrastructure that makes EVs more feasible in

the Australian market.


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6. References

Ashtari, A, Bibeau, E, Shahidinejad, S & Molinski, T 2012, PEV Charging

Profile Prediction and Analysis Based on Vehicle Usage Data. IEEE 3, 341-350.

Australian EVs sales figures 2015, The Australian Electric Vehicle

Association, viewed 15 April, < http://www.aeva.asn.au>.

Carbon Footprint Calculator 2014, The United Nations, viewed 20 April 2015,

<http://www.nature.org/greenliving/unf-carbon-calculator>.

Dunstan, C, Usher, J, Ross, K, Christie, L & Paevere, P 2011, Supporting

Electric Vehicle Adoption in Australia: Barriers and Policy Solutions,

Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research

Organization (CSIRO).

Mader, T 2012, Western Australian Electric Vehicle Trial, The University of

Western Australia.

Mcpherson, C, Richardson, J, Mclennan, O & Zippel, G 2011, Planning an

Electric Vehicle Battery-Switch Network for Australia.

AustralianTransport Research Forum.

Nordelof, A, Messagie, M, Tillman, Ljunggren S & Mierlo, J. 2014,

Environmental impacts of hybrid, plug-in hybrid, and battery electric

vehicles-what can we learn from life cycle assessment? The

International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, 1866.

Richard, B 2011, Short Circuit - Hydrogen is back in favour as electric vehicle

limitations are realised, The Age.

Smith, R, Shahidinejad, S, Blair, D & Bibeau, E L 2011, Characterization of

urban commuter driving profiles to optimize battery size in light-duty

plug-in electric vehicles. Transportation Research Part D, 16, 218-224.

Sparking an Electric Vehicle Debate in Australia 2013, Department of Industry

and Science, Energy Supply Association of Australia (ESAA),

accessed 14 April 2015,

<http://ewp.industry.gov.au/files/Sparking%20an%20Electric%20Vehicl

e%20Debate%20in%20Australia.pdf >.


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Speidel, S, Jabeen, F, Olaru, D, Harries, D & Brauni, T 2012, Analysis of

Western Australian Electric Vehicle And Charging Station Trials.

Australian Transport Research Forum.

electric vehicles_technical briefing research

Documents

figure list figure

levels of charging stations

table list table

public ev charging stations

technology of infrastructure

pmedian location model

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