Peak shaving and minimum cost operation of an electric vehicle charging station based on Multi-port Power Electronic Interface

In this paper, an energy management system for Multi-port Power Electronics Interface (MPEI) is developed to be used in public electric vehicle charging stations. The MPEI has power electronic converters to interface with the utility grid, photovoltaic panels, battery energy storage, and the loads. In order to achieve a minimum daily utility cost, the proposed energy management system provides an economic dispatch of the grid converter considering time-of-use price of electricity and peak shaving functions. Experimental results have been presented to demonstrate the technical capability of the MPEI system and its controllers to operate under various dispatching strategies. A numerical solution of the day-ahead economic dispatch optimization problem is also presented to demonstrate how the dispatching power commands can be calculated based on a suitable forecasting model of the load and photovoltaic generation.