bidirectional

Newgrange Warrior

With recent storms & power outages, can you run your house electricity off a compatible Ev? Do you need a special charger or do esb allow??

zg3409

Some EVs offer Vehicle to load (V2L) which is typically a 3 pin domestic socket in the car. This can be used for small loads such as powering your fridge or wifi router. It has enough power to boil d little bit just that on its own.

They should not be wired to house fuse board.

Other options if your car does not have vehicle to load is to buy a small inverter and connect to cigarette lighter in car or directly wired to cars 12 volt battery, which is topped up by the main EV battery when the car is on. Again for smell loads only.

People in Ireland have used these systems, it's really useful if you can say power your oil heating burner for a few hours and heat your entire home and keep freezers cold.

crl84

I don't think there's any V2H (vehicle to home) cars available here yet?

Similarly no V2G (grid), which would enable people to sell electricity from their car back to the grid, which would be very profitable for people with free work charging.

I've seen various people with V2L who charge a home battery (same as solar batteries) from the car, and then run appliances from that battery. I was reading about a guy who charges his MG4 in work each day, then comes home and charges 10kW batteries from the car, and runs lots of the house from the battery overnight/throughout the next day.

As mentioned above, you could just use the V2L to power a few low power items directly from the car in the event of a power cut. You'll need a car with V2L capability and an adapter.

ted1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122941786#Comment_122941786

VW cars have V2H but the chargers required aren’t readily available

kaahooters

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058383916/bidirectional

any chademo can do it, its designed for it, but, its… tricky. ESB does alow it, but you have to have a switich installed, and an inverter, i think.

CelticRambler

It's technically feasible. Sufficiently so that it's prompted a spike in sales of EVs in Ukraine, because people can then use them as a "battery backup" during their frequent power outages.

The guy from Technology Connections (on YouTube) has also spoken about using his to get him through a four-day outage in … Minnesota, I think.

Exactly how you'd set it up would depend on how regularly you think you might use it.

Soarer

Can you use V2L capability to charge one EV from another using a granny cable?

fafy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122944232#Comment_122944232

i believe this can be done, handy in an emergency zero range situation, allthough very slow !

As for the V2H, there is a home EV V2H model available in Europe, “Quasar 2” but its early days of this tech, i don’t think its available in Ireland yet.

https://wallbox.com/en/quasar-2-bidirectional-ev-charger

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122944503#Comment_122944503

I don't think this product is available anywhere, from faq

"Quasar 2 can charge all CCS2 vehicles. However, bidirectional functionalities are only permitted with certain EV manufacturers, and more expected to enable bidirectionality with Quasar 2 in the near future." With no list of compatible cars. One interesting thing they mention is it's cheaper than a home battery, and when you think about it say a basic home battery is 5k, then this may make financial sense if it turns out to be real.

Qsaab

Hi all. Re wired the house about 5 years ago and put in change over switch to change from mains supply to generator. Bought an ev6 which has v2l earlier this year and was going to look at it as a back up supply if power goes. There’s a socket in garage to plug in generator and was going to get a cable to connect v2l plug to it. I see it mentioned in earlier post, not to connect to fuse board. Just wondering is this to avoid drawing too much power from the car if a load of things are switched on or is there another reason. The way I was thinking of doing it was to turn off the mcb’s going to the elec oven/hob freezer etc to avoid overloading it. Would this make sense ? 

cstagg

I have a 2022 ID4. It went in and got a big system update last year and now it has bidirectional option in the battery menu. The battery is approx 77Kwh so we all know that would run a house for a few days. So once this comes in we be all jumping on it.
We just need to change the charger and probably the inverter. I have been looking everywhere and all I can find is the Quasar 2 charger mentioned above. Need to try get a price.

Does anyone know if Irish regulation is required to allow V2H?

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122968848#Comment_122968848

Quasar 2 does not seem to have a price from what I can see. The car probably only has V2L which is different to v2h or v2g. Irish regulations for solar inverters are very strict with many inverters needing an "Irish" only setting. If this is an AC system then inverter will need to be part of wall charger or part of house side. If it's AC to AC then that's in the car, but most cars can only supply very limited power and only to a physically separated supply to parts of the house. Proper solar inverters just top up supply to the house and if house draws more it takes a big from the grid. V2L cannot do this.

cstagg

How can we find out if ID4’s supports v2h?
We actually sold our ID4 and awaiting on delivery of the new one in January. When it comes Ill take a picture of the information on the cars touch screen and post it up here.

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122973622#Comment_122973622

Even if it supports it, you are unlikely to be able to buy the house side equipment. If you can buy it then it's unlikely to be approved for use in Ireland (like the Tesla power wall cannot be used in ROI but ok in UK) You may have sold your new EV before this is a real thing, great in theory but lots of hurdles from car companies and electricity suppliers who want a cut of dny profits or to delay uptake like they have restricted solar panels energy exports

Laviski

not wanting to derail but why can't we get powerwall here but you can in the UK? i thought uk and ireland infra was tied to the hip in design…..

ted1

I didn’t think the power wall was banned. It shouldn’t be any different than a battery on a PV system.

Probably more a case of Tesla not selling it

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122975343#Comment_122975343

The Tesla power wall does not have the "Ireland" option in the menu which is specific rules just for us.

ted1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122976528#Comment_122976528

I’m trying to understand what you are saying , it’s not quite clear.

What Ireland option?

Is that they just don’t sell it here , so don’t bother with the option

so it’s not banned they just haven’t applied for the correct certification

isn’t EN50438 an EU standard

cstagg

I would expect the Quasar 2 is also covered under EU legislation which will cover Ireland?

ted1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122976845#Comment_122976845

The main thing it that you can not have an invertor powering a system that is connected to the grid, so a Quasar will be no use to you in a power cut, the reason been that there may be a Network technician repairing the line and there's a risk of electrocution if your invertor is powering the line. ESB will open breakers up stream, but cant disconnect individual houses.

CivilEx

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122944232#Comment_122944232

Yes - Bjorn had a video on this a while back.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPCMlf2n9lk

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122977039#Comment_122977039

You can if it's isolated, the same as any inverter designed to power the house from a home battery in event if power failure. This is available for solar here. Also all generators at hospitals etc operate where they have safety isolation from the grid when the generator is running.

The Irish inverter regulations are not the same as EU regulations, hence we can't use Tesla power wall in ROI only, but ok elsewhere in EU.

ted1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122977357#Comment_122977357

if it’s isolated. Then it’s not connected to the grid….. it needs a changeover switch not just a isolator

Powerealls aren’t banned. They are non compliant. Two very different things.

our protection settings aren’t much different than others and are easily set in software. And could easily be configured

cstagg

A gateway like link below will solve the problem and safely isolate the house from the grid

https://www.sigenergy.com/en/products/gateway

ted1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122977619#Comment_122977619

from 12kw up. Which indicates it won’t work for domestic muse in Ireland

zg3409

Fast forward 2.5 minutes, no cars actually support this bi-directional charger

https://youtu.be/8JDJpFO3Eeg?si=fYxB7DxMt6a_p0Ud

cstagg

Tesla doesnt have the technology to support bidirectional charger which you can see in the video comments.
Failter solar are selling the Sigen bidirectional charger (in your video). Ill give them a buzz in the new year and see if its available in Ireland 🇮🇪

https://failtesolar.com/uk/product/sigen-ev-dc-charging-module-25-kw-5m-cable-ccs2/

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122999381#Comment_122999381

What would be the use case ? If no cars support it then it's a bit pointless. Even if a specific car enables it then it's likely that car will only work with certain partner brands which may not be this company. Seems very early tech.

DesperateDan

Resurrecting this thanks to Eowyn :) so we have a 2024 VW ID4 sitting in the driveway and no power, water (well pump) or heating (electrics to boiler), and this thing supposedly supports V2G and V2H.

The info on this is very hazy, any time I see it come up numerous people say things like V2H is impossible in Ireland. Can someone correct me if I am wrong, going from this webpage :

• V2G - Export power from the car to the grid. Bidirectional wall charger and car required, Wallbox Quasar 2 support has been announced by VW. Zappi are developing one for 2025.
• V2H - Power house fuseboard from the car. Bidirectional charger and car required, CT Meter, Isolation Switch, Changeover Switch (can these be the same thing?) required.
• V2L - Power a 3 pin socket with some low energy items. CCS adapter and Bidirectional car required.
  

What makes it a little confusing is discussion on Irish regulations and why the Tesla Powerwall is not available here which seem to be a totally separate issue?

I know people here have automatic changeover switches + solar + batteries and basically experience no loss of supply when there's a grid power cut. So can our ID4 not do the same thing as say x4 5kWh batteries, except with nearly 80kWh of available power?

CMOTDibbler

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123103647#Comment_123103647

V2G and V2H are not allowed here yet afaik. The charger has to be bidirectional and I think these are being tested in a pilot scheme atm.

Isolation switch and changeover switch are different. Isolation disconnects the charger from the mains, changeover switches the mains supply from the grid to the generator or other power source so that you don't send your generated power out to the grid and electrocute some poor ESB worker.

Edit: Here's a post on Reddit from yesterday about why it's not implemented yet.

I should clarify the reason this is difficult to implement at a Residential level is because often supply for Residences comes from a single transformer, that may supply 100 - 1000 homes. A Comerical premises like a farm, office or factory will often have it's own transformer. So it's much easier for a ESB/NIE engineer to check that there is no live electric feedback coming down the line and to stop it.

Not so easy if there's 1000 homes all with their own indiviudal change over switches and one fails and now the lines are live because someone's electric switches aren't properly maintained. Also it's harder to track and isolate.

DesperateDan

I understand that logic but I have probably seen 50 Irish residents across Boards, reddit, FB claim they have a battery setup with automatic changeover switches installed and sit warm and toasty on their internet when there's national powercuts like this.

So are we saying V2H despite needing the exact same equipment as the solar batteries these people all have, require different regulations that no one has come up with yet? Can you point to any info on the pilot scheme? I found this one line on the IEVA site:

> However, unlike V2L, V2H & V2G are currently only available via pilot schemes in Ireland.