pacific nw transportation consortium region 10 Pactrans

E-Mobility in Cold Climates: Coordination of Electricity and Transportation Networks

PI: Mohammad Heidari Kapourchali (UAA), mhkapourchali@alaska.edu, ORCID: 0000-0002-2082-7879

Co PIs: Osama Abaza (UAA)

AMOUNT & MATCH: $40,000 federal from PacTrans; $40,000 federal Match

PERFORMANCE PERIOD: 8/16/2023 – 8/15/2025

STATUS: Active

CATEGORIES: Electric Vehicles, Transportation, Mobility

UTC PROJECT DOCUMENTATION:

FINAL PROJECT REPORT: will be available once completed

PROJECT DATA: will be available once completed

DESCRIPTION:  Electric vehicles have shown great potential in reducing fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. The total number of electric vehicles on the road reached 5.1 million in 2019 and will increase to more than 100 million by 2030. Over the next five years, the U.S. will deploy DC fast charging stations along its interstate highway system under the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) formula program. The large-scale deployment of NEVI charging stations will significantly increase charging demand, posing challenges to power systems. Charging stations on the road would also have an impact on traffic flow, thereby coupling the electricity and traffic networks tightly. In September 2023, at the Alaska Infrastructure Development Symposium, the Alaska Energy Authority (AEA) and the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOT&PF) announced their first round of awards for NEVI funding. AEA and DOT&PF selected projects in nine Alaskan communities for a total investment of $8 million. The $6.4 million in NEVI funding will be matched with $1.6 million from private entities selected to install, own, and operate the new electric vehicle (EV) charging stations.

Alaska villages are also seeing increased interest in electrical vehicle adoption. As part of a National Science Foundation project (EVITA), the PI has been investigating the interactions of electrical vehicles with cold weather, the electricity grid, people, and policy in the Arctic. The EVITA project, like mainstream electric vehicle research, focuses on electrical vehicle operation and planning from the perspective of the energy network. To fully understand the EV integration impacts, the behavior of electric vehicles needs to also be studied from the transportation network perspective. The study will be of significant importance in Alaska, as the unforgivable climate of the Arctic lowers electric vehicle efficiency and range, increases energy use and EV dwelling time, slows charging, and can decrease reliability and damage electrical efficiency. This proposed project aims to model the impact of electric vehicles on both the power grid and traffic flow. This will involve developing models for integrated electric and transportation networks, formulating optimal strategies for charging and discharging electric vehicles, and determining the ideal placement of charging stations. Successful completion of the proposed project has the potential to provide insights to legislators and policy-makers on the incentives that electrical vehicles could offer to improve the traffic network operation and resilience.