An advanced smart management system for electric vehicle recharge

Recent studies about climate change are mandating a drastic reduction of green house gas (GHG) emissions. Solutions include the utilization of renewable energy sources (e.g., wind, solar energy) and the increased utilization of hybrid and electric vehicles (EVs). In this scenario ICT can play a significant role by fostering the smart utilization of current energy and transportation infrastructures (smart grid and smart cities). This paper presents a new ICT infrastructure to enable the intelligent exploitation of distributed energy resources in order to minimize the EV charging times while optimizing the efficiency of the electrical infrastructure. The proposed system is based on a distributed communication infrastructure (both wired and wireless) aimed at collecting/emitting bidirectional energy dispatching opportunities for electric vehicles. The envisaged system seamlessly interconnects emerging self-organizing wireless technologies (i.e., VANETs and Wireless Mesh Networks), with legacy wired communication technologies, to guarantee a fast rollout of the EV charging service with minimum investments in communication infrastructures. The performance of the proposed solution is evaluated in terms of its sustainability by analyzing the quality of the charging service as perceived by the users, and the capability of the charging infrastructure to meet the charging requests in a timely manner.