Distributed Charge - GRID is a general purpose implementation of Distributed Charge. The hardware and software expands upon several revisions of Distributed Charge EV. The initial version of Distributed Charge - GRID is well suited for industrial applications where a landlord may want to submeter electrical energy to their tenants, but it can be repackaged for other use cases. The form factor of the demonstration shown is portable and operates at 120V single phase version with NEMA 5-15 receptacles for quick testing, but it is scalable to 4 MW at 480V three phase with no architecture changes.
Features
- Dynamic free market energy trade:
- Buyer sets limits on sale period, minimum and maximum payment size, maximum initial deposit, minimum current, nominal voltage and voltage fluctuations, sale rate profile.
- Seller provides an offer. If the offer terms are within the buyer's limits, the buyer accepts the offer and the seller requests payment.
- The seller turns on power once the agreed upon initial deposit has been paid. If the buyer fails to make payments, or does not agree to the seller's new sale terms when the sale period has ended, the seller turns off power. If the seller does not deliver power as advertised, the buyer can stop making payments.
- Dual metering allows both the buyer and the seller to independently measure the energy being delivered, eliminating the relevance of third party weights and measures regulations.
- Trust is minimized by both parties.
- No centralized middle man required. Distributed Charge allows anyone producing power to sell it directly to a customer.
- Hardware:
- No third party server hosting required. All hardware can be in owner's physical control.
- Built around Board A0 and the TOFU.
- Electrical energy meter with revenue grade measurements.
- Built in cellular connectivity.
- Built in 3.7V lithium ion battery backup for starting up the payment module before any payments have been made and the seller has turned on power.
- Built in display for detailed status monitoring
- Software:
- Python source code.
- The buyer publishes the real time rate that it is paying locally via ZeroMQ for Smart Loads to adjust their behavior intelligently.
- SSL encrypted and authenticated communication between the buyer and seller. Manual seller (server) public key fingerprint verification, no PKI used.
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