SBRI: electric vehicle charging, sustainable energy solutions

The City of Edinburgh Council (CEC) has a number of off-street electric vehicle (EV) chargers. EV charging technology is improving but still doesn’t offer optimal smart city and smart grid solutions. Edinburgh needs an integrated innovation energy solution that can cater for future mass market potential.

The aim of this competition is to support the development of an integrated and scalable low carbon EV charging solution.

The solution should incorporate renewable on-site generation, battery storage, bi-directional smart meters and an innovative software system. Each of the technological components should complement one another. This will create a closed-loop, innovative EV charging solution with smart grid, vehicle-to-grid and capacity management capabilities.

It should be possible to scale up this smart charging solution to fit several EV charging units in a small space.

The solution will probably require back-up from the grid when the on-site renewables are not generating. The storage system should be designed to trickle charge overnight, or at times when the tariffs are lower.

There must be a software platform or control system that allows each technological component to interact in an effective and sustainable way.

The charging solution should produce revenue for the council, with the potential to apply this to its entire charging infrastructure. You should also consider schemes for charging tariffs to drivers. This will make the supply and installation of further charge points financially self-sustaining.

Applications must attribute at least 50% of the contract value directly and exclusively to R&D services. R&D can cover exploring solutions and design. It can also include prototyping and field-testing the product or service. R&D does not include:

• commercial development activities such as quantity production
• supply to establish commercial viability or to recover R&D costs
• integration, customisation or incremental adaptations and improvements to existing products or processes

Eligibility

To lead a project, you can:

• be an organisation of any size
• work alone or with others (businesses, research base and third sector

Funding and project details

This is phase 1 of a potential 2 phase competition. A decision to proceed with phase 2 will depend on the outcomes from the first phase. Only successful applicants from phase 1 will be able to take part in phase 2.

The overall programme will be delivered over 2 phases.

Phase 1: R&D contract

A feasibility study resulting in a technical and commercial specification and detailed design package for both on and off-street solutions.

In the first phase, R&D contracts will be awarded to demonstrate the technical feasibility of your proposed solution. In this phase:

• a total of up to £80k has been allocated
• feasibility study R&D contracts are expected to be in the region of up to £20k for each project
• 4 projects are expected to be funded for up to 6 months
• the assessors will consider fair value in making their evaluation
• as a result of your R&D work you will submit detailed technical, financial and design specifications

Your financial business case should detail the investment required for your solution to be rolled out in phases on a much wider

Phase 2: prototype development and testing resulting in installation of the prototype to test functionality.

In this phase:

• a total of up to £200k has been allocated
• R&D contracts will be awarded to businesses chosen from the successful phase 1 applicants
• project costs are expected to be up to £100k for each contract
• you will develop a prototype and undertake field-testing

Projects are expected to range in size up to total costs of £20k per applicant.