Mobile energy-to-home integration: An adaption of mobility as a service in urban energy systems

Mobility as a Service (MaaS) represents a paradigm shift from personally owned transportation modes towards mobility provided as a service. Using electric vehicles (EVs) as a mobile energy storage media, this article presents a new application scenario of MaaS in urban energy systems, referring to as the mobile energy to home (ME2H) integration. An architectural design of the ME2H system is proposed in this study, which is cantered by a ridesharing-like booking system. Through the booking system, a customer can appoint nearby on-road EVs to come to plug in and temporarily supply energy to their site with an agreed price lower than purchasing energy from the external grid. The ME2H booking system then interfaces with the customer-side home energy management system and the EV driver-side trip planner. Based on the ME2H booking schedules, the two decision-making systems plan the household appliance operations and travel paths for the ME2H service receiver (the customer) and provider (the EV driver), respectively. This study also investigates two representative scenarios to demonstrate the effectiveness of ME2H in urban energy systems.