As expected, the bidirectional EV charger market is taking off. The device that can both charge and export an EV battery’s power into a home or onto the grid has been excitedly touted for the last few years without any actual products available on the market. That’s starting to change, as Delta Electronics recently joined Fermata Energy and Siemens (through the Ford Charge Station Pro) as bidirectional chargers achieving UL 9741 certification, the standard that covers bidirectional charging equipment and includes functionality to export power to the grid. And plenty more companies, such as Enphase, SolarEdge, Wallbox and GM Energy, are preparing to finally bring their own utility-approved bidirectional chargers to market this year.
Credit: Sunrun and Ford
It’s an exciting time for consumers and installers alike — homeowners hesitant to purchase a stationary battery may be more likely to use their EVs like batteries with a bidirectional charger, and an uptick in charger installation means more auxiliary business for solar contractors during another bumpy ride on the solarcoaster. The residential solar market may temporarily be in flux, but EV charger installation and energy storage education could be a fruitful side hustle.
The Dept. of Energy has thrown its support behind vehicle-to-everything (V2X) research. The federal government is gathering national labs, local governments, utilities and private companies to accelerate the adoption of bidirectional charging into energy infrastructure. Companies like GM, Ford, Honda, Sunnova and Wallbox have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to shape the future of transportation and grid reliability.
“Bidirectional EV charging will play an increasingly important role in supporting the electrical grid and improving the country’s energy security and resilience in coming years,” said Rima Oueid, DOE’s V2X MOU lead and commercialization executive at the Office of Technology Transitions. “Our [electrical grid] system will be more dynamic and complex, but it will also be cleaner, more resilient, secure and affordable if we harmonize energy and transport by continuing to be thoughtful in our collaborations and investments.”
A few noteworthy developments in the bidirectional charger and V2X arena are:
- Enphase’s bidirectional charger will be available this year. The charger will use Enphase grid-forming IQ8 microinverters and its own energy management technology.
- GM Energy, not to be outdone by competitor Ford, unveiled the Ultium Home suite of products, including the PowerShift bidirectional charger and V2H enablement kit, for use with the 2024 Silverado EV.
- SolarEdge expects its bidirectional charger to be commercially available in the second half of 2024. This new charger would also enable an EV to be charged directly from a solar PV system without any AC-to-DC power conversions.
- Wallbox and partner Bidirectional Energy have received $2.2 million in funding from the California Energy Commission to deploy the Wallbox Quasar 2 bidirectional charger in homes throughout the state.
- PG&E established another V2X pilot program with an EV manufacturer, now testing BMWs in the utility region. BMW joins Ford and GM in tests to help the California utility “unleash the full potential of EVs to enhance grid resilience and reliability for customers.”
- SDG&E turned to Toyota to explore bidirectional power flow in Southern California. The region is one of the largest Toyota EV ownership areas in the state.
All these developments mean someone must install the chargers. Ford is partnering with Sunrun and GM is working with SunPower as their preferred installers of EV charging accessories, but plenty more of the EV-agnostic chargers will be installed by local contractors.
San Diego-based HES Solar is already experienced in installing traditional EV chargers — CEO Ross Williams said the large majority of HES’s residential solar installs are paired with this technology.
“On the residential side, it’s insanely easy. You just add an outlet. Oftentimes, it’s like a closing tool: We’ll throw in an EV outlet for you,” he said.
If not installing up-front, many of HES’s existing solar customers will call the company back to install a charger once they have an EV. Williams expects that to be the case once more bidirectional chargers enter the market, and HES is looking forward to the opportunity.
“Conceptually, I absolutely love the idea. I cannot wait for it to be a thing, because it’s going to change a lot for my customers,” he said. “We do sell a lot of stationary storage, mostly Powerwalls. But an average EV has the equivalent of about eight Powerwalls. That’s huge. The idea of powering your house with your combination of stationary storage and solar and your car makes a lot of sense.”
This story is part of SPW’s 2024 Trends in Solar. Read all of this year’s trends here.
I know this is not what this topics about fully, but the bidirectional charging is the tip of the iceberg. I I just transitioned out of 15 years of being a solar installer because in California it’s very turbulent times (NEM 3.0), we were installing a lot of batteries for the past 5 years when working in the trade. When talking to the customers asking why they chose batteries, it was to supply their house with back up power during the outages. Once I took bidirectional charging into consideration I decided that’s the nail in the coffin because once this technology gets distributed, It’s really hard to see a future in residential solar. They’ll just choose that over a home battery because most of the customers just wanted battery back up for outages and that could be now done with energy from your car my question is my assumption true?
And the utility rates for battery back up in California is concerning, because Will the utility companies make the fixed charges high, so there’s not a ROI?
I wish solar power world would discuss these issues because theres not any real information being talked about anywhere to help support and give hope to the solar installer trade industry, the only news easy to read is the utilities propaganda. Saying that California has too much solar energy and now they’re having to shunt it off to ground or pay other states to take it. Where’s the solar industry point of view? Will there be government funded utility gravity fed batteries to help aid this issue?
Another one is that solar is not sustainable with net metering 1 for 1 kWh rate and solar customers are free loading by not paying their fare share to keep the utility infrastructure running? Is that true?
There seems a lot of concerns that aren’t being addressed, and that’s why I left solar because all my assumptions are leading to residential solar slowly weaned out for utility scale solar, so the utility’s can just buy energy from them so residential customers aren’t digging into there profit margins, is this true?
I keep looking every week to see if there’s any information to give me hope and hasn’t been any. Except the NEM 3.0 repeal, with the California Supreme Court. And there’s no information on that really, when is the date their going to have the repeal be processed? What would be the options in the repeal? Thank you I know this is a lot of unsolicited questions, I’m just looking for people that might have answers. Thank you again if you read this far I appreciate it.
Enphase just delayed bi-directional charging til 2025…
Are these chargers going to have chademo connections?
Enphase’s bidirectional charge can be equipped with either a CHAdeMO or CCS connection but not both at the same time. Customers will be able to choose which connection they prefer prior to installation. It’s unclear how difficult or affordable it will be to switch out the connection post installation.
Here’s a demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V628rHwUfYE
When will more EV cars with V2X capability be available? I have been watching the evolution of chargers and that seems to be happening. But there have also been several auto company announcements of V2H or V2G capabilities but I have yet to see much actual availability. I was holding off purchase of my second EV until 2024 when I anticipated more V2H availability but finally gave up and bought a low end EV without it. I am afraid we are still a couple years from widespread availability. By the way, when Tesla offers its V2? capability in 2025 per their announcements, will it be available in existing Teslas like my 2022 Model 3?
We’ve been hearing about bidirectional charging for years. Leafs have had the capability for more than a decade. It’s 2024 and there are still zero products available domestically. At this point, we have officially been in “believe when we see it” mode for years.
How does this change the current need for the home integration system that ford has now with Sunrun?
You need Ford’s home integration system in order to use your Ford Lightning in V2X situations. Sunrun is the preferred installer of Ford’s EV charger.
Great to see SolarEdge leading the way in efficiency by using DC direct from roof PV for EV charging!
As this bi-directional charging capability expands, it’s going to reactivate the solar industry in CA that is currently in a dramatic, but temporary recession. V2G, combined with stationary battery storage & solar parking lot canopies is the “secret sauce” that can rapidly scale in typical (sub)urban large apartments & condos, business parks & neighborhood shopping centers to flatten the infamous “Duck Curve”. As BEV adoption expands, more & more owners will be exploiting VPP subscriptions through V2G chargers at home & work. The utilities have finally recognized that this is inevitable. Large remote utility scale solar farms that would require new transmission will not be approved if local, behind the meter solar + storage can fill the demand.