Proving V2G Interoperability: From Standards to Scalable Deployment
Vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology has long held an exciting promise: electric vehicles (EVs) can become more than transportation. When connected and aggregated as part of virtual power plants (VPPs), EVs can become flexible grid resources. They can provide energy services that help utilities balance generation and load and increase grid flexibility, at a time when growing electricity demand is placing unprecedented pressure on available generation and grid capacity.
At the 8th V2G Business, Policy & Technology Forum, organized by the Smart Grid Observer and hosted by the American Center for Mobility in Detroit, we took an important step toward making that vision practical.
The Forum brought together utilities, automakers, charging providers, aggregators, national laboratories, regulators, standards organizations, and technology companies. What stood out was the degree of cross-industry collaboration focused on one of V2G’s fundamental challenges: Can independently developed technologies operate together reliably as an integrated system?
Keysight’s Andrew Cifala moderated a thought-provoking panel with several industry thought leaders
Proving the Complete V2G Chain
A centerpiece of the Forum was a standards-based end-to-end V2G interoperability test bed. This was developed collaboratively by technical teams from various companies representing multiple parts of the ecosystem.
V2G requires far more than successful communication between a vehicle and a charger. A grid-service request may originate with a utility’s DERMS, pass through an aggregator and charging infrastructure, and ultimately reach the EV. The EV then responds to the request by supplying the expected amount of power back to the grid through the charging equipment.
Each interface can involve equipment and software from different vendors using different communications protocols and technical standards. Two devices can conform to their respective standards and specifications to perform correctly in isolation, yet encounter interoperability problems when incorporated into a larger system.
End-to-end testing exposes those system-level interoperability issues before they reach commercial deployment.
Connecting Communications with Physical Power
A first-of-its-kind, end-to-end V2G interoperability demonstration made this challenge tangible. Both AC and DC V2G configurations were demonstrated.
Keysight’s portable Charging Discovery System (CDS) and Communications Interface Tester
A DERMS provided by DTE Energy and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL)initiated an energy service request, directing an EV to export power to support the grid. In the AC-V2G environment, this request passed through Voltra’s aggregation solution and an Emporia Energy charger to a Keysight emulated SAE J3072 EV/AC onboard inverter, using ISO 15118-20 Amendment 1 communications. The AC work was particularly timely because it applied a UL 1741 SC – a recently released standard with newly introduced programs for certifying AC-V2G chargers.
In the DC-V2G environment, the request was sent to Ampverve’s aggregator software, which relayed the message to Heliox’s DC charger, ultimately terminating at one of two systems which were interchangeable during testing:
- 1. A bidirectional electric school bus provided by Ann Arbor Public Schools and
- 2. An ISO 15118-20 based EV and DC battery emulator from Keysight.
The system then executed the requested energy service, producing a power response that flowed through the charger to an emulated grid.
Keysight’s hybrid DC+AC grid emulator
The real significance was demonstrating system-level interoperability across the entire energy-service chain, with multiple communications protocols operating across independently developed systems and producing the intended physical power response at the grid interface.
This test bed establishes a modular reference environment that can help move the industry toward repeatable end-to-end interoperability and conformance testing. Standards and protocols evaluated include IEEE 1547, UL 1741 SB, UL 1741 SC, SAE J3072, IEEE 2030.5, OCPP, and ISO 15118, including ISO 15118-20 Amd. 1.
Interoperability is an Ecosystem Challenge
One of the clearest lessons from this work is that no single organization can solve end-to-end V2G interoperability.
Technical teams spent months working across organizational boundaries, followed by intensive integration and on-site testing. DTE Energy, PNNL, Emporia Energy, Voltra, Heliox, Ampverve, Keysight, and other participants contributed different elements of the end-to-end V2G architecture. That collaboration is not incidental to V2G. It is fundamental to making V2G work at scale.
Automakers, charging manufacturers, aggregators, and utilities do not develop their technologies as one integrated system. Standards establish the interfaces between them. System-level testing demonstrates whether those interfaces function together and ultimately produce the expected grid response.
The Forum extended that collaboration to regulators, test organizations, standards experts, and policymakers. Their involvement matters because scaling V2G requires more than technical feasibility. Utilities, manufacturers, and regulators need confidence that these systems can be integrated, validated, and deployed reliably.
From Demonstration to Deployment
The discussion in Detroit was not simply about whether V2G can work. Increasingly, the question is: How do we make it repeatable, interoperable, and scalable?
Forum sessions addressed standards, interoperability, certification, policy, customer economics, utility programs, cybersecurity, and market design. These discussions included “Scaling End-to-End Interoperability: Connecting Lessons Learned to Commercial Deployments,” which I was honored to moderate.
The panel brought together Keyur Shah, Head of Strategy, Product, and Marketing at Heliox; Yukihiro Hatagishi, Electric Vehicle Charging Hardware Systems Researcher at the National Laboratory of the Rockies; Chris Taylor, Hardware Product Line Manager at Emporia Energy; and Alexander Stratmoen, Co-Founder and CEO of Voltra.
Together, we explored how lessons from end-to-end interoperability testing can help move the industry from successful demonstrations toward repeatable, commercial V2G deployments.
Building a Repeatable Path to V2G Scale
The next step is to build on what we learned.
That means expanding the test bed, strengthening standards-based test procedures, and introducing additional vehicles, chargers, aggregators, and utility systems. The goal is an environment where the complete energy-service chain can be exercised and validated. During the last eight iterations of the V2G Forum, we have discussed the need to bridge industry and technical boundaries between EVs, charging infrastructure, aggregators, and the electric grid. In Detroit, teams across this ecosystem moved that discussion into practice, demonstrating how those boundaries can be bridged through end-to-end interoperability.
As a result, we now have a stronger technical foundation, and a proven model for collaboration, to move the industry from concept and demonstration toward deployment at scale. As a member of the V2G Forum steering committee since inception, I look forward to continuing this work with industry partners and helping move V2G closer to commercial scale.
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