The Vehicle-Grid Integration Council is Ready to Promote Flexible Electric Vehicle Charging and Discharging to Support California Executive Order N-5-24
November 18, 2024
Sacramento, CA — On October 30, 2024, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Executive Order N-5-24 to address California’s affordability crisis, help curb rising electricity costs, and provide electric bill relief.
The Governor’s Executive Order seeks to address the rising electricity costs Californians have been experiencing by evaluating programs that could be inflating customer bills and evaluating utility wildfire mitigation expenses, the largest source of cost increases, for potential savings.
The Vehicle-Grid Integration Council (VGIC) is actively engaging with key stakeholders in California, including the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and California Energy Commission (CEC), to ensure electric vehicles (EVs) provide critical cost relief for all electric utility ratepayers through more efficient use of the existing grid, thoughtful integration of new EV load, and enabling EVs to serve in distributed virtual power plants (VPP).
Achieving California’s ratepayer affordability goals will require a broad toolkit, including a comprehensive set of vehicle-grid integration (VGI) strategies that alleviate system costs. These strategies include innovative rate designs, utility tariffs, and cost-effective pilots and programs. Refining this existing menu of VGI tools will support the adoption of managed charging solutions and bidirectional charging equipment needed to facilitate widespread customer participation.
“VGIC is excited to continue our work with the California Public Utilities Commission, California Energy Commission, and others to advance customer access to vehicle-grid integration (VGI) applications. EVs currently represent immense, untapped potential to lower rates for all utility customers – including non-EV drivers – by supporting efficient use of existing grid infrastructure and right-sizing future infrastructure investments. In fact, VGI offers one of the few sets of tools available to California as it aims to tackle the affordability crisis. Leveraging EVs as a large class of flexible load and distributed energy storage also supports California’s ambitious 100% EV sales by 2035 and 100% clean electricity by 2045 goals, making VGI a total win-win-win for ratepayers, EV drivers, and society at large. California is at the forefront of developing VGI policy. What we do here to leverage EVs to reduce bills can serve as a model for the rest of the country,” says Zach Woogen, VGIC Interim Executive Director.
Media Contact: Shannon McGuire, VGIC: smcguire@vgicouncil.org
About Vehicle-Grid Integration Council
Vehicle-Grid Integration Council (VGIC) is a national 501(c)(6) membership-based trade association committed to unlocking electric vehicles as a strategic grid resource through policy development, education, outreach, and research. VGIC is the only association dedicated to ensuring customers are recognized and compensated for the value of managed charging, bidirectional charging, and DER-paired charging to create a more affordable, reliable, and efficient electric grid. VGIC members include American Honda Motor Co., Inc., BorgWarner, Fermata Energy, Ford Motor Company, General Motors, Nissan Group of North America, Bidirectional Energy, Clean Power Alliance, Customized Energy Solutions, dcbel, Eaton, Emporia, EnergyHub, ev.energy, Flux, GridBeyond, Gridwiz, Holy Cross Energy, Hoosier Energy, Hyundai Cradle, Kaluza, Landis+Gyr, Leap, Los Angeles Department of Water & Power, Mercedes-Benz Research & Development North America, Inc., Nuvve Holding Corporation, Orange Charger, Peak Power, Peninsula Clean Energy, PowerFlex, QCells, Sacramento Municipal Utility District, Stellantis, Sumitomo Electric, Tesla, The Mobility House, Toyota Motor North America, Inc., and WeaveGrid. To learn more, visit vgicouncil.org.