US$16 Billion Market Forecast for Off-Grid EV Charging

In this blog last week, we had Elodie Hestin from Socomec talking about the opportunities offered by off-grid charging for EVs. This week, IDTechEx has published a forecast on the potential size of the off-grid market. It is well established that the early adopters of electric vehicles are also early adopters in other areas, such as solar panels, heat pumps and smart meters, now it seems there is also a commercial case for off-grid charging technology for both passenger cars and industrial vehicles, such as medium and heavy-duty haulage, construction, agriculture, and mining vehicles, which are also under pressure to reduce emissions.

The new IDTechEx report entitled “Off-Grid Charging For Electric Vehicles 2024-2034: Technologies, Benchmarking, Players and Forecasts”, estimates that the market for off-grid charging could increase to a market size of US$16 Billion over the next decade. The research also investigates the different ways that off-grid generation, storage and charging can be achieved. It looks at how EV uptake is challenging our ageing electricity grids and estimates that 22,000TWh (22 billion kWh) of energy is required to replace the energy that we currently get from fossil fuels. This is an even bigger problem for locations that may not be connected to the grid, such as the areas where many industrial vehicles operate.

At the moment, solar power is the market leader in off-grid EV charging. This mainly consists of overhead photovoltaic canopy that shades the car and provides charge to the battery. These are free to operate once installed. However, solar has problems in that it generates a fairly low amount of electricity, which could be suitable for top-ups charging in consistent sunlight, but it can’t compete with fast charging. Solar power also can’t charge at night, or when the weather is bad.

An alternative for off-grid charging could come from hydrogen power. IDTechEx research has found that there is a small but growing market for fuel cell generators, where on-site stored hydrogen can be converted to electricity when needed. Many of these have been designed for distributed generation; however, there is an emergence of these hydrogen fuel cell generators to charge EVs.

Hydrogen can produce electricity at any time, regardless of the weather, as long as there is a supply of hydrogen. This is in contrast to renewable generation, which is intermittent. Despite the benefits, it can be difficult to source hydrogen that is both cheap and sustainable. IDTechEx analysis also shows that the type of hydrogen used significantly impacts the overall CO2 emissions. Hydrogen derived from green sources is very environmentally clean, while hydrogen that is made from fossil fuel sources can be more environmentally damaging than a diesel generator. In spite of these challenges, IDTechEx believes that hydrogen-powered EV charging will have strong growth over the coming decade, especially in sectors that require higher charging and are most difficult to connect to the utility grid. Construction and public highway fast charging are also highlighted in the report, with that overall market value expected to reach US$14 billion by 2034.

www.IDTechEx.com/OffGridEV