Charging Electric Vehicles in the Smart City: A Survey of Economy-Driven Approaches

Electric vehicles (EVs), as their penetration increases, do not only challenge the sustainability of the power grid but also stimulate and promote its upgrading. Indeed, EVs can actively reinforce the development of the smart grid if their charging processes are properly coordinated through two-way communications, possibly benefiting all types of actors. Because grid systems involve a large number of actors with nonaligned objectives, we focus on the economic and incentive aspects, where each actor behaves in its own interest. We indeed believe that the market structure will directly impact the actors' behaviors, and as a result, the total benefits that the presence of EVs can earn in the society, hence the need for a careful design. This survey provides an overview of economic models considering unidirectional energy flows and bidirectional energy flows, i.e., with EVs temporarily providing energy to the grid. We describe and compare the main approaches, summarize the requirements on the supporting communication systems, and propose a classification to highlight the most important results and lacks.