Stochastic Modeling of Vehicle Arrival for the UK's First Electric Vehicle Charging Forecourt

Increased attention is paid to reducing the greenhouse gases resulting from combustion processes either from energy generation stations or the transportation sector. Countries are setting rules and targets to govern this issue and electrification of transportation is spreading. One of the motivations for people use electric vehicles may be the availability of rapid charging stations which function similarly to the conventional fuel stations (forecourts). The UK's first solar EV charging forecourt is being built and commissioned with a 5 MWh on-site battery to store energy from a solar farm and to enable arbitrage for grid services. To enable optimum site operation, predicting the arrival of electric vehicles at different times of the day and hence the load demand, determines the availability of the battery for bulk power supply or fast-frequency response to the grid. This paper presents the outline of a stochastic model for the electric vehicle arrival and charging at the site using the concept of vehicle population-types. The model considers the stochastic nature of different parameters controlling the charging process e.g. the charging start time and the state of charge (SoC) at start of the charging session.