Electric vehicle adoption and its impact on 2035 German power demand

Abstract

Stringent emission regulation and consumer driven eco-friendly demand encourage automotive manufactures to reduce the Green House Gas-emissions of passenger vehicles. The introduction of battery electric vehicles reduce the average Green House Gas-emissions as they lack tail-pipe emissions, and as such have been deemed required to meet 2050 emission targets. This thesis forecasts electric vehicle adoption in Germany by 2035 and assesses the electric vehicle related power demand through the evaluation of three different power demand scenarios, i.e. charging scenarios, as this might cause transmission grid congestions. By developing an electric vehicle adoption model, based on a general market diffusion of an ‘S-curve’ pattern, political targets, historical electric vehicle stock and total cost of ownership developments have led to a projection of 10,5 Million additional electric vehicles in Germany by 2035. The underlying assumptions are that total cost of ownership parity with internal combustion engine vehicles will be achieved between 2025 and 2030. Long-term political targets form the main driver for electric vehicle deployment up to total cost of ownership parity, and historical electric vehicle adoption are important for future developments. The German electric vehicle stock is estimated to have an annual energy demand of roughly 26 TWh in 2035. This result is based on the average German mileage for passenger vehicles, specific energy consumption per kilometre and the projected electric vehicle stock. The first power demand scenario is the ‘domestic charging’ scenario. The domestic charging scenario has an estimated 31 GW of power demand, resulting from a maximum power output of 3.7 kW per connection and a domestic charger per electric vehicle ratio of 0.8. The second scenario is the ‘public charging’ scenario, which had an estimated power demand of 41 GW. This resulted from the June 2016 German ‘Charging-mix’ containing an average maximum power output of 26 kW per connection and a public connection per electric vehicle ratio of 0.15. The third and last scenario is the ‘fast-charging’ scenario, resulting in a power demand of 37 GW based on the 2035 German electric vehicle stock forecast. For the ‘fast-charging’ scenario the average maximum power output was assumed to be 50 kW per connection with a connection to electric vehicle ratio of 0.07. The presented results are based on worst case scenarios, whereby the likeliness of occurrence is aligned with the order of discussed scenarios. Starting with domestic charging, this is the most likely scenario to occur. Further research is advised on the topic of public charger deployment and it is advised to update the electric vehicle model in the coming years.