Development of an IoT system with smart charging current control for electric vehicles

This paper presents the development and test of an Internet of Things (IoT) system for monitoring and control of electric vehicles. The IoT architecture, which was developed using the Firebase platform, allows the synchronization of the vehicles' data to the online server, as well as the access to the data outside of the vehicle, though the Internet. The smart charging system proposed in this paper allows the control of the electric vehicle's battery charging current in real time, based on the demand at the residence (home current), which is measured using a residential wireless sensor network (WSN). An Android mobile app was developed to access the vehicle's data. This app communicates with the wireless sensor nodes of an intra-vehicular wireless sensor network (IVWSN), which was developed using the Bluetooth Low Energy (RLE) protocol. A real time notification system was also implemented to alert users about certain events, such as low battery and full battery charge. The main features of the proposed IoT system are validated through experimental results.This work is supported by FCT with the reference project UID/EEA/04436/2013, COMPETE 2020 with the code POCI 01-0145-FEDER-006941

A novel multi-objective off-board EV charging station for smart homes

A novel multi-objective off-board EV charging station (EVCS) for smart homes is proposed, where the option to integrate a set of functionalities in a single equipment for the smart grid power management is a distinguishing contribution. The EVCS is carefully described along the paper, where its attractive functionalities are: (a) Direct interface with the EV battery, permitting to achieve a flexible grid-to-vehicle (G2V) and vehicle-to-grid (V2G) operation, according to the demand response strategy of the smart grid; (b) Operation as a smart active power conditioner independently of the EV presence; (c) Operation as a reactive power compensator, agreeing to the requirements of the power grid. These functionalities allow to enhance the power quality points in smart homes and grids. The control algorithm of the EVCS is meticulously defined according to the smart home control and the smart grid necessities, aiming to accomplish with the aforementioned functionalities. This paper offering an experimental validation, obtained with a developed prototype, which corroborates the attractiveness of the multi-objective EVCS for smart homes and grids.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia(UID/CEC/00319/2013)info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio