Setting the Pace: Driving the VGI Revolution Forward
Reflections on an inspiring and transformative year at VGIC
By Ed Burgess
The turning of the calendar to a new year is a natural time to take stock. By any measurement, I am extremely proud of the achievements of Vehicle-Grid Integration Council team over the past 12 months, and am excited by what is in store in 2023 for our organization and how we plan to support the VGI ecosystem during this truly dynamic and transformative period.
The team operated at a very high tempo in 2022, submitting more than 40 unique regulatory filings, while also expanding and deepening our industry and stakeholder education efforts. These included initiating our new quarterly newsletter to a rapidly expanding audience, as well as hosting an informative webinar with guests from Nuvve and Ford Motor to dive deep on the VGI incentives codified in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. The team was also quite active at industry events. In particular, we drew big crowds at Forth Roadmap and the EverythingEV USA conferences.
Last but not least, we were incredibly pleased by the interest we received for our V2X Interconnection Best Practices special initiative and the best practices we identified. We are thankful for the organizations that have already signed up as members of this new working group and expect there will be considerable forward movement in the V2X space in 2023 and beyond.
We see strong evidence that our efforts are bearing fruit. In particular, we are thrilled to have worked with Pacific Gas & Electric Co. to establish the country’s first V2G export rate for commercial electric vehicles, and believe this landmark pilot lays the groundwork to establish other innovative V2G programs across the country. Also in California, VGIC supported the California Public Utility Commission’s (CPUC) submetering decision, making the Golden State the nation’s first to enable subtractive billing by EVSEs and moved forward prospects for establishing a telematics-based protocol. We were also pleased to see the California Air Resources Board (CARB) adopt ACC 2 regulations, which allow for more flexibility on battery durability and create space for V2X considerations going forward.
Policy wins were not limited to California. In New York, another state where VGIC continues to ramp up our engagement, the New York Public Utilities Commission (PUC) approved a managed charging program that authorized $98 million in VGI-related funding across six utilities through 2025. And I would be remiss not to highlight that VGI innovation continues to gain momentum at the federal level, with the Department of Energy launching a Vehicle-to-Everything MOU and an EV Grid Assist program. VGIC is also pleased to participate in the National Renewable Energy Lab’s EVs@Scale Lab Consortium and looks forward to supporting this innovative effort across the national laboratories to establish a secure and scalable infrastructure to support the rapid growth of EVs across the country.
We could not have achieved these milestones without the support of our members. We are pleased that our membership has more than doubled since our establishment in 2020, and now totals 25 innovative and engaged members. In a fitting culmination to a very active and impactful year, we also were excited to have had the opportunity to meet as an organization at our Annual Member Meeting in Berkeley, California, last month, where we aligned on the major focus areas – notably compensation mechanisms and interconnection policy – in 2023.
At that meeting, we were treated to the insights of thought leaders who are supporting the advancement of our industry.
Aloke Gupta, Supervisor, Demand Response, CPUC Energy Division, Zeryai Hagos, Deputy Director, Office of Markets and Innovation, NY DPS, and Stephanie Palmer, Air Resource Engineer, California Air Resource Board, participated in “Weathering the Storm: Lessons from Year 1 and Future Role of VGI in Grid Reliability.” We also heard from CPUC Commissioner Cliff Rechtschaffen and Siva Gunda, California Energy Commission Commissioner, on “Role of VGI in Accelerated Transportation Electrification.” What fantastic discussions!
In sum: What a year! I hope you share my enthusiasm for what was accomplished to advance the role of electric vehicles and smart EV charging and discharging through policy development, education, outreach, and research. And I have no doubt that the best is yet to come. On behalf of the entire VGIC team, we look forward to building upon our efforts and impact delivered to-date, accelerating our country’s progress toward achieving a world-class, decarbonized transportation and energy sector with EVs leading the way.