A panel of vehicle-to-grid (V2G) experts came together at Intersolar & Energy Storage North America 2025 to discuss how electric vehicles (EVs) can add resiliency and reliability to an increasingly overloaded electric grid.
Moderated by Ryan Gallentine, the managing director of transportation at Advanced Energy United, the panel affirmed that EVs can be valuable grid assets for customers and utilities alike. Alison Cumming, the director of V2X and grid services at PowerFlex, explained she’s excited by how EVs are turning into “batteries on wheels.”
PowerFlex is a clean technology solutions company that offers solar, energy storage, electric vehicle charging and the adaptive energy management platform PowerFlex X.
“EVs have the potential to produce the exact same grid services as stationary storage systems for fleets or residential customers,” she said. “This is a great way for customers to provide valuable services to the grid while gaining revenue.”
V2G, Cumming pointed out, can lower or eliminate the cost to utilities of infrastructure upgrades, leading to reductions in electricity rates.
“Let’s call [utilities] electrification facilitators,” said Ben Clarin, a senior principal in electric transportation at Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI). He explained that utilities essentially have two jobs: keep rates low and keep the grid reliable. This is done by managing peaks through V2G activities and active charging management, he said.
Gabriela Olmedo, a regulatory affairs specialist at EnergyHub, echoed Clarin.
EnergyHub is a company that works with utilities to harness millions of distributed energy resources to meet the grid needs of a cleaner, more reliable power system.
“The most critical things a utility can do to manage EV loads coming online are active managed charging and daily load shaping,” she said. While EVs can be included in demand response or time-of-use rates, Olmedo noted those approaches only go so far because of the clustered nature of EV charging.
“When everyone in a neighborhood starts charging their EVs at nine p.m. when the time-of-use rate ends, that rate spike isn’t going to be great for the grid infrastructure,” Olmedo explained. “Active managed charging will be critical.”
Clarin explained that utilities see V2G as an investment. Over 3,000 utilities exist nationwide. Each has a different level of EV deployment and electric loads. Deploying V2G won’t be a one-size-fits-all solution.
“From a market standpoint, they want consistency and less volatility,” he said, adding the industry needs more standardization around V2G deployment. Still, the incentives are going to be different for V2G. “We need to ask, ‘What are the no regrets investments a utility will have?’ and go from there. That will come with increased adoption.”
Panelists also explained that, for potential customers, V2G has a marketing problem.
“Most people are much more passionate about their car than their stationary battery, thermostat or load control device,” said Russell Vare, the vice president of vehicle grid integration North America at The Mobility House. “How do you get a residential customer to want to have that resource contribute any value to the grid? You provide them that value.”
The Mobility House is a company that offers charging solutions for corporate, logistics and bus fleets as well as for operators of charging stations.
In North America, he explained, that often looks like providing backup power. It gives the customer a valuable resource and keeps them actively engaged.
“EVs are the most unique distributed energy resource we have from a grid perspective,” Vare said, adding that the reliability and resilience they can provide to individual customers and the wider power system is unmatched by other distributed energy resources such as residential solar and energy storage.
“They can either be a grid problem or a grid solution,” Olmedo said.
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