The next Volvo EX90 Electric SUV will offer two-way charging capability and can be used as a power bank to power devices on a camping trip, charge other electric vehicles or perhaps even power the home as a backup, Volvo recently confirmed.
While full details on the EX90 aren’t expected until November 9, when the EX90 makes its official bow, it’s likely that Volvo will use a pack comparable to the 111kWh of CATL cells confirmed for the Polestar 3 which will be built alongside it in South Carolina, good for a range of up to 300 EPA miles. Volvo also recently teased a few details about how this energy feature works; and Green Car Reports followed up with Olivier Loedel, head of Volvo’s electrification ecosystem, to ask some more pointed questions.
The Volvo EX90 will offer two-way charging
The Volvo EX90 will offer two-way charging
Volvo’s Occupant Detection System makes its debut in the EX90
One of them concerns the carbon footprint. Volvo has confirmed that the EX90 will offer a battery of over 100 kWh. For Volvo and anyone who cares about durability, that’s heavy, as larger batteries add to the capacity of the vehicle. carbon footprint— not only in terms of the extra resource and energy burden for manufacturing, but also in terms of the extra emissions in the use phase to carry that extra weight over the lifetime of the vehicle. One of those questions, then, was whether Volvo, as a very carbon-conscious automaker, was looking to offset the rather bulky pack with the two-way capability.
Based on Loedel’s answer, the answer is yes. “The more renewable energy you use, and when you charge the car, of course, the better the carbon footprint of the car,” he said. “And that’s where with two-way charging combined with different use cases and smart charging, we’re also helping our customers to be more sustainable in the use phase.”
Carbon footprint of the Volvo C40 Recharge compared to the XC40 ICE according to energy sources
“On the battery side, when it comes to the EX90, we want to cover all your needs…but we are also very aware that on a day-to-day basis you may only be using a fraction of it, and that is why bi-directional charging could not only bring you substantial economic benefits that reduce energy but also, more actively, support the grid,” Loedel explained.
Volvo is currently evaluating what this means in terms of carbon numbers, but the result for this and even the savings for the end user can be very different depending on all sorts of variables related to energy sources and the electrical network. In Volvo’s home market of Sweden, customers using time-of-use charging could potentially save €500 per vehicle per year. And if you add the vehicle to the network, it can go up to 800 euros per vehicle per year.
That’s why, on one release, the combination of time-of-use charging and advanced bi-directional capability that could potentially use your car’s battery to help buffer the grid seemed lacking in detail.
The reason is, in part, that many of these details vary by market. The company stressed that two-way charging will initially only be launched in “selected markets” as it is currently investigating the potential. However, time-of-use charging functionality will be available everywhere, Loedel said.
Volvo C40 Recharge 2022
As such, the EX90 will launch with all the necessary hardware for vehicle-to-home functionality, but Loedel acknowledges that this will require additional equipment: a two-way charging station and a home energy management system. The latter will be connected to the home panel, the cloud and the Volvo.
So far, the only automaker to offer such hardware is Ford, with the F-150 Lightning and its Ford Charge Station Pro and Home Integration System which, for $3,895, adds an inverter, power switch disconnection and a battery to effectively use the truck for home backup power. Nissan also recently announced a bi-directional charger for the Leaf, in the United States, which allows the EV to help buffer the grid. And hyundai and Lucid have announced home energy systems that so far lack US details.
Volvo said it was looking to make the whole charging (and discharging) process “automatic and managed entirely by the smart charging functionality of the Volvo Cars app”. This would allow and encourage off-peak billing when the network is less busy and prices are low.
Loedel hinted that given the automaker’s plan to go fully electric by 2030 globally, it is moving forward with a range of products in this area.
2023 Volvo XC40 Refill
And to make sure it works in as many markets as possible, Volvo has prepared its hardware for different versions of two-way charging. This means that Volvo includes hardware to switch between AC and DC with the technology in every EV90.
“We will be enabling bi-directional AC and DC charging, and we will continue to monitor this in the future, and this may differ from market to market,” Loedel said. “But those two will be supported, based on the ISO standard.”
This may require firmware or software updates, but Volvo is ready for that too. It should offer over-the-air updates with the EX90 that allow access to the full range of vehicle firmware and systems.