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Optimal Design and Implementation of Solar-Powered EV Public Charging

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DOI: 10.1007/978-981-15-8221-9_198

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Optimal Design and Implementation
of Solar-Powered EV Public Charging
Station

R. Sheeba, S. Sheik Mohammed, Varun S. Prakash, P. Abhiraj, S. Haripriya,

and K. Kiranjith

Abstract The use of electric vehicles is growing fast as a dependable alternative

to gas-powered vehicles. These vehicles require their batteries to be “fueled up”
for continuous operation. The electric vehicle charging has traditionally been grid-
based but the use of solar-powered chargers has materialized as a fascinating opening.
These chargers are pollution free and provide clean electricity for electric-powered
cars. This paper presents the design of an intelligent hybrid electric vehicle charging
station suitable for commercial as well as domestic utility.

Keywords Electric vehicles · Charging station · Solar PV · On grid

1 Introduction

There has been a rapid growth in the use of electric vehicles as an alternative to gas-
powered vehicles due to the increase in awareness towards a sustainable lifestyle.
Traditionally, the electric vehicle charging has been grid-based but the technological
advancement in the field of solar energy has led to the use of solar-powered chargers
for the electric vehicle charging. These pollution free solar chargers provide clean
electricity to the electric vehicles and additionally results in a green environmental
effect. Furthermore, the introduction of these charging stations would enable the
people to rethink their means of transportation choices and thus switching to zero-
emission vehicles [1].
By every year, electric vehicles are becoming more and more affordable which
leads the investors to start investing on charging station due to its increasing demand.
At present, electric grids are more dependent on fossil fuels than that of the renewable
energy. Though EV’s are electrically driven, they also will contribute to harmful
emissions as electrical energy production for charging stations should also be taken
into consideration which are going to be additional generation from fossil fuels.
Thus, in order to reduce the impact of the harmful emissions, renewable energy,

R. Sheeba · S. Sheik Mohammed · V. S. Prakash (B) · P. Abhiraj · S. Haripriya · K. Kiranjith

Electrical and Electronics Department, TKM College of Engineering, Kollam, Kerala 691005,
India
e-mail: varunsmannar@gmail.com

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2021 2131

V. Komanapalli et al. (eds.), Advances in Automation, Signal Processing, Instrumentation,
and Control, Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering 700,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-8221-9_198
2132 R. Sheeba et al.

particularly solar energy-based electric vehicle charging stations can be built [2].
This paper provides the design of a charging station that uses conventional grid
supply for commonly available vehicles, to design and develop a solar fed charging
station, to collect power details of electric vehicles, to implement the charging station
that has the capability to utilize solar energy when it is available and switch to grid
supply otherwise [3]. A charging station powered by the conventional grid supply
has got many limitations and disadvantages, and hence, we use solar energy for the
charging purposes. The switching circuit enables the switching of circuits, and the
implementation of maximum power point tracking (MPPT) enables the tracking of
maximum solar energy.

2 Contemporary Review on Charging Station Development

The design of charging station infrastructure relies on the standard of electric vehi-
cles available in the area of implementation. Various charging techniques can be
incorporated on analyzing the requirement of the connected load. Charging of the
electric vehicle battery is generally achieved by three methods: Conductive charging
method [4, 5], Inductive charging method [6, 7], and Battery swapping technique [8,
9]. Electric auto rickshaws which favour conductive charging are our focus of study
(Fig. 1).
Conductive charging techniques are classified as level one charging, level two
charging, DC fast charging, based on the charging time and supplied power.
Level 1 charging uses a 120 V which creates lesser impact on electric utility peak
demand charges. This is a slow charging method, typically ranging 3–5 miles per
hour.
Level 2 charging uses 240 V power to enable faster regeneration of an EV’s
battery system. This type of charging needs the installation of an EVSE unit and
electrical wiring capable of handling higher voltage power. This is a popularly used

EV Charging Methods

Conductive Inductive Battery

Charging Charging Swapping

Level 1 Slide Swapping

Level 2 Static Inductive Dynamic Inductive Rear Swapping
Level 3 Charging Charging Bottom Swapping
Top Swapping

Fig. 1 Different EV charging techniques

Optimal Design and Implementation of Solar-Powered EV … 2133

method of charging for EV’s. It has a faster charge time capacity, ranging 10–20 miles
per hour. This method of charging has a 3% gain in efficiency than level 1 method
of charging. Apart from the discussed benefits, the level 2 charging method is more
expensive than level 1.
DC fast charging provides compatible vehicles with an 80% charge in 30–60 min
by converting high-voltage AC power to DC power for direct storage in EV batteries.
Automakers currently accept the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) J-1772
plug for level 1 and 2 charging, except for Tesla which has an adapter. For DC fast
charging, there are three plug types used by different manufacturers: the CHAdeMO,
SAE Combined Charging System (Combo/CCS), and Tesla Supercharger. Nissan and
Mitsubishi vehicles use CHAdeMO while current and upcoming vehicles from US
and European manufacturers have SAE CCS ports [10]. It is nearly as quick as refu-
elling a gasoline vehicle. Significantly, more expensive than level 1 or level 2 equip-
ment and high-voltage three-phase power connections to utility further increases
installation costs.
In [11], author describes a DC microgrid charging station with bulk storage Li-Ion
batteries and the integration of renewable energy sources like wind energy and solar
energy. The paper discusses a control logic method to absorb maximum power from
the DER’s.
In [12], charging strategy is developed so as to manage the charging plan of vehi-
cles using binary and linear programming. This model was capable of reducing the
cost to 60% without management. The charging station was grid-connected charging
time is divided into intervals to minimize the peak consumption.
The paper [13] presents the impact of EV’s on the power network. The study is
performed for the worst case scenario, by connecting depleted EV’s with the power
network for analysis. This paper also highlights the detailed modelling of DC fast
charging station as constant impedance load.

3 Methodology of Proposed Project

Domestic motor vehicle sales in India during 2016–17 included 3.05 m passenger
vehicles, 0.71 m commercial vehicles, 0.51 m three wheelers and 17.59 two wheelers.
The luxury car segment is relatively small with sales of just over 40,000 cars in 2018.
The total number of registered motor vehicles reached approx. 230 million in March
2016 [14].
The India Government envisages the number of EV’s to be rapidly increase and
also expecting the achievement of complete electric mobility by the year 2030. Rapid
growth in the sales of EV’s correlate to the rising demand of electricity, which
would encourage the government more likely to implement fossil fuel-powered
generating stations. Hence, this act would also contribute to harmful emission to
the environment.
2134 R. Sheeba et al.

The primary solution for the above crisis would be the dependency on renewable
energy resources. Therefore, here, in this paper, a solar-powered grid connected
system with charging capabilities for electric auto rickshaw is presented and
designed. The paper discusses the effect of solar generation through proper result
analysis. Distribution of PV Modules are studied. Load profile of electric vehicle is
established to prepare the dependency to the grid power.

4 Proposed Design

A solar-powered grid connected charging station is considered, where a 6 kW solar

system is selected for performance study. The system is to be installed Chinnakkada,
Kollam, Kerala, India for facilitating provision for charging of electric auto rickshaw
operators. The integration of solar panel compensates the energy supplied to the load
from the grid. The 6 kW system is chosen considering the load profile of the electric
auto available within the described area. The system is capable of extending the
capacity to meet future demand.

4.1 Simplified Schematic Diagram

PV array is capable of generating a certain required demand. As the system is grid tied,
excess requirement is compensated by utilizing sufficient power from the grid supply.
The overall schema is distributed into three subsystem P array, system, user/load,
Fig. 2.

4.2 Geographical Location Selection and Orientation

of Panels

The proposed solar powered charging station is to be implemented on the location

Chinnakkada, Kerala, India as mentioned in Table 1.
A suitable value of 15° tilt angle and module facing south direction is selected for
study. The meteo data of Chinnakkada were suitably chosen for calculation using
PVSyst software.
Optimal Design and Implementation of Solar-Powered EV … 2135

Fig. 2 Simplified schematic diagram of the system

Table 1 Geographical data of the proposed charging station

Geographical site Chinnakkada Time zone UT + 5.5
Latitude 8.89 N Longitude 76.59°E

4.3 Design of System

The determination of solar panel modules required for representing a 6 kW requires

an approximately 24 nos. Therefore, by choosing the JAP6-72-250 model solar panel
module, the overall area requirement was suggested as 40 m2 [14].
Inverter, solar lake 7000TL-PM, total power 7 kW AC, with MPPT capabilities
were selected with consideration for the addition of further modules in the future
[15]. Therefore, a total of 30 Modules, housed within an area of 59 m2 were shown,
Fig. 3.

4.4 Load Profile

The charging station is designed to suit for electric auto’s; load profile varies between
4.8 and 5.4 kW. Simultaneous usage of multiple load was also considered with a
maximum value up to 10.8 kW. The daily load profile of e-autos from our observation
is shown in Table 2. Figure 4 represents the daily load graph.
2136 R. Sheeba et al.

Fig. 3 PV panel and MPPT inverter characteristics

Table 2 Daily load profile, average = 30.6 kWh/day

0h 1h 2h 3h 4h 5h 6 h 7 h 8 h 9 h 10 h 11 h
12 h 13 h 14 h 15 h 16 h 17 h 18 h 19 h 20 h 21 h 22 h 23 h
Hourly 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 10.20 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 5.40 kW
load 4.80 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 5.40 4.80 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 kW

Fig. 4 Daily load graph Average= 30.6kWh/day

Load Power (W)

5 Result of Designed System

5.1 Simulation Results

PVsyst simulation results show a produced energy of 11.64 MWh/year, specific

production 1552 kWh/kWp/year and a performance ratio of 78.64%.
The observed results of normalized production are shown in Fig. 5 and perfor-
mance ratio graph from Fig. 6.
Optimal Design and Implementation of Solar-Powered EV … 2137

Fig. 5 Normalized
productions

Fig. 6 Performance ratio

5.2 Balances and Main Result

Global hour Horizontal global irradiation E_Solar Energy from the sun
T_Ambient Ambient temperature E_Grid Energy injected into grid
E_Array Effective energy at output of array EFrGrid Energy from the grid
E_User Energy supplied to the user
2138 R. Sheeba et al.

Table 3 Main results of energy utilization

Global hour T _Ambient E_Array E_User E_Solar E_Grid EFrGrid
(kWh/m2 ) (°C) (MWh) (MWh) (MWh) (MWh) (MWh)
Jan 168.5 27.17 1.151 0.949 0.287 0.829 0.522
Feb 167.3 27.78 1.086 0.857 0.271 0.782 0.585
Mar 195.2 28.72 1.190 0.949 0.288 0.866 0.661
Apr 176.3 28.29 1.025 0.918 0.257 0.735 0.661
May 165.7 28.56 0.940 0.949 0.240 0.670 0.708
June 137.1 26.58 0.787 0.918 0.206 0.554 0.712
July 151.2 26.62 0.866 0.949 0.222 0.616 0.727
Aug 163.9 26.65 0.962 0.949 0.251 0.680 0.698
Sept 167.0 26.48 1.019 0.918 0.244 0.743 0.674
Oct 157.8 26.85 1.005 0.949 0.251 0.723 0.698
Nov 137.3 26.48 0.918 0.918 0.235 0.653 0.683
Dec 154.8 27.10 1.068 0.949 0.266 0.769 0.683
Year 1942.0 27.27 12.017 11.169 3.017 8.620 8.152

Table 3 indicates energy distribution over whole year, representing the horizontal
global irradiation, ambient temperature, effective energy at output of array, energy
supplied to the user, energy from the sun, energy injected into grid and energy from
the grid.
Annual Array output is obtained to be 12.017 MWh, energy supplied to the user
as 11.169. Energy injected to the grid is 8.620 MWh/year and Energy from the grid
as 8152 MWh/year.

6 Conclusion

At EV stations, some electric vehicles have on-board converters that can plug into a
standard electrical outlet or a high-capacity appliance outlet. Others either require or
can use a charging station that provides electrical conversion, monitoring or safety
functionality. Our proposed system focus on electric auto’s, where Mahindra Treo
and Kerala Automobiles Ltd are the major distributors of the same in Kerala with
battery capacity ranging 5.4 and 4.8 kWh. Both the e-auto providers have imple-
mented an on-board charger which requires a 230 V power supply. It is profitable
to use solar energy for public utilities while considering its long-term economic and
environmental benefits. The cost of battery is a factor which restricts many to use a
panel–battery arrangement. Moreover, usage of an electro chemical battery coins its
effect of harmful environmental hazards and reduces the overall system efficiency,
as it doesn’t provide enough energy while discharging as compared to the energy
required for charging.
 Optimal Design and Implementation of Solar-Powered EV … 2139

The feasibility of our proposed system is that it is capable to provide the energy
to load almost from the solar PV array. On analyzing the overall energy injected
and supplied to and from the grid, it can be concluded that the overall system is
self-sustain enough to provide supply to the load profile.

Acknowledgements The proposed work is doing under the project funded by Directorate of
Environment and Climate Change, Kerala Government.

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