Page 1 of 1

Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 8:44 am
by Yuff
With Octopus releasing a V2G product including a BYD lease car then we are hopefully getting close to the next generation of chargers and opportunities to run homes and export back to the grid and make some savings, as early adopters of solar did 15 years ago,and still reaping the benefits of that foresight.
I am trying to get a quote, albeit the engineer isn’t quick at updating me, on the options to increase our storage.
We have a GivEnergy storage system which works pretty well but he suggested I might be able to go for a Foxess system and ac coupled inverter and that might be a more cost effective system and I’d have 2 separate systems, not sure how god an idea that is though.
V2G and V2H seem to be an alternative option to spending a load of money on home storage systems when we have 3-4 EVs sitting on the drive most days :oO:

Re: Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 8:58 am
by AGT
I’ve been giving this some thought and I think for my house, I could easily run a new Swa next to the existing charging point, take this to the battery location and just have a 230 volt to 48 volt charger.

This would use the adaptor that Joeboy uses to provide the connection to the car, appreciate it limits power but nice and simple with no big brother controls

My company looking into salary sacrifice schemes now and EV’s that have V2L are on my agenda

Re: Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 9:13 am
by Stinsy
There is no technological reason we don't already have V2G. Plenty of cars can do it. Just the manufacturers (eg VW) can't figure out how they can profit instead of the customer.

It would've been great if the powers that be hadn't made some really dumb decisions around the official standards. For example, the inverter should be in the car, not strapped to the wall of your house. It is nice to see the V2L cars that use the charging port are ignoring the official standard. Maybe we'll see V2G inverters built into cars soon? Is that what BYD has done?

Re: Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 9:38 am
by Yuff
It’s frustrating that the government don’t make any long term decisions and stick to them.
I pay £108 a year for a gas supply, I haven’t used this year, because we have a gas fire. OFGEM have stated that companies have to offer a standing charge free tariff this year but still no sign of mainstream providers offering them. One company offers a gas tariff with no standing charge, however you can only get that tariff if you also have their electric tariff which is nowhere near as good as IOG….. :head-bang:
When we had our panels and storage installed we had an iboost fitted but that became obsolete when you could export at more than it cost to heat the immersion.

Re: Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 11:53 am
by dan_b
The Octopus/BYD project is using the "Bi-directional Zaptec Pro"

This is a Type 2 AC, 3-phase compatible charger with built in 4G.

So it's doing it via AC, in a "vehicle 2 load" manner similar to how some cars are doing this already but with a special dongle.

I assume therefore it'll be limited to 7kW house load for domestic installs?

Amusingly, the Zaptec website page about V2L is currently this

https://www.zaptec.com/what-is-v2g-and- ... l-charging

Re: Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 12:07 pm
by SimonSays
... and Octopus have recently launched their own AC charger - with no mention of any bidirection capability!

https://octopus.energy/press/octopus-en ... v-charger/

and a link with a picture:

https://www.current-news.co.uk/octopus- ... v-charger/

This will put Octopus directly into competition with MyEnergi, Hypervolt and Ohme.

Re: Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 3:02 pm
by dan_b
Well I guess they already have their own branded heatpump. They might as well go the whole hog and start selling Octopus Solar and Octopus Batteries.

Re: Bi-directional charging

Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2025 3:17 pm
by AGT
Get everyone hooked on their technology and then change the tariffs!