AGL Makes Significant Inroads into Electric Vehicle Home Charging Industry, Pursuing Ambitions Beyond Fossil Fuels
AGL Embraces EVs and Virtual Power Plants to Drive Energy Transition
Australia's largest coal generator, AGL, is making a significant shift towards a cleaner and more flexible energy future. The company is capitalising on the opportunity to orchestrate the flexible load of electric vehicle (EV) batteries, enabling smart charging and vehicle-to-grid integration.
AGL's strategy is centred around smart charging, load orchestration, and multi-asset Virtual Power Plant (VPP) integration. By managing EV charging, home batteries, and other distributed energy resources, AGL aims to reduce peak demand, stabilise the grid, and optimise energy use, thereby decreasing reliance on coal-fired generation.
Key components of AGL's approach include:
- Smart EV Charging and Throttling: AGL can automatically throttle public and home EV chargers during high grid demand periods to balance the load and avoid system stress. This reduces coincident peak demand to about 450 watts per vehicle, a low load compared to traditional appliances.
- Customer Incentives through Pricing Plans: AGL encourages EV owners to shift charging to off-peak times via simple price signals and offerings like the Night Saver EV plan, which lowers charging costs and helps flatten peak demand.
- Virtual Power Plant (VPP) Orchestration: AGL integrates home batteries, solar, hot water systems, and EV smart chargers through its VPP platform, called NEO. This enables coordinated control of distributed energy resources to respond rapidly to grid needs.
- Multi-Asset Flexibility: By orchestrating various assets together — residential batteries, solar, EV loads, hot water systems — AGL can manage network load more dynamically. Their Peak Energy Rewards program incentivises demand reduction or shifting during peak periods, increasing customer participation and reducing the need for coal-backed generation.
- Scale and Growth: AGL has grown its orchestrated decentralised assets to 1.5 gigawatts, demonstrating the scalability of these solutions with hundreds of megawatts of batteries operational or under construction.
AGL's suite of EV plans, propositions, and partnerships are expected to form the foundation of future growth. Approximately 35,000 customers are on AGL's EV energy plans, with the average daily load of these customers shifting to the overnight "super off peak". This shift in load benefits both AGL and its customers in terms of pricing and portfolio outcomes.
The EV Night Saver plan, specifically designed for EV owners, is a key component of AGL's strategy. The plan, along with offerings like Ovo Energy's "Free 3 Plan", provides free energy from 11am to 2pm. AGL can also orchestrate hot water systems to solar soak and optimise load profile management.
AGL's CEO, Damien Nicks, stated that they are capturing a disproportionate share of the rapidly growing EV market. The Net Promoter Score (NPS) for AGL's EV Night Saver customers is +41, indicating high customer satisfaction.
This integrated approach reflects AGL’s broader commitment to the energy transition, using EVs not just as electric demand but as active participants in a smarter, more resilient, and lower-emission electricity system. The shift from "baseload" thinking to flexible demand and supply is critical, and AGL's orchestration of EV battery load is a development that will play a significant role in this transition.
[1] AGL (2021). AGL's EV Orchestration Trial. Retrieved from www.agl.com.au/aboutus/media-centre/media-releases/agls-ev-orchestration-trial
[2] AGL (2021). AGL's Energy Transition. Retrieved from www.agl.com.au/aboutus/sustainability/energy-transition
[3] AGL (2020). AGL's EV Night Saver Plan. Retrieved from www.agl.com.au/residential/products/electric-vehicles/agls-ev-night-saver-plan
[4] AGL (2020). AGL's NEO VPP. Retrieved from www.agl.com.au/aboutus/sustainability/energy-transition/neo-vpp
- AGL is leveraging the flexibility of electric vehicles (EVs) and Virtual Power Plants (VPPs) to spearhead the energy transition in Australia's industry, aiming to decrease reliance on coal-fired generation through smart charging, load orchestration, and multi-asset VPP integration.
- To achieve this, AGL has introduced programs such as Smart EV Charging and Throttling, Customer Incentives through Pricing Plans like the Night Saver EV plan, Virtual Power Plant (VPP) Orchestration, Multi-Asset Flexibility, and the Peak Energy Rewards program.
- The company's EV strategy includes the efficient management of network load by orchestrating various assets, including residential batteries, solar, EV loads, and hot water systems, to optimise energy use and respond rapidly to grid needs.
- AGL's commitment to the energy transition also extends to partnerships and initiatives in the finance, technology, and lifestyle sectors, such as the EV Orchestration Trial, the Energy Transition, the EV Night Saver Plan, and the NEO VPP. These efforts position AGL as a key player in the growing electric-vehicle market, with a high customer satisfaction rate as indicated by the Net Promoter Score (NPS).
