Feasibility Study and Economic Analysis of an Add-On Battery for Electric Vehicles

Abstract

This research reviewed challenges in electric vehicles (EVs) charging during trips and proposes a novel powertrain architecture that is cost-effective and time-efficient for EVs to instantly increase their range without deviating from their route. The main objective is to study the feasibility and economic analysis of an additional battery for EV applications without disturbing the traction battery under unknown future charging requirement information about EVs, which helps reduce waiting time at charging stations, mitigate the problem of battery swapping, charging 100% through renewables, reduce the negative impact of EVs on the power grid. This study considers an add-on battery of 15kWh capacity offered as battery-as-a-service (BaaS), available at charging stations or delivered at remote locations for users. We conducted an economic analysis, comparing EVs with and without add-on batteries alongside traditional petrol and diesel vehicles. Based on the results obtained, it can be inferred that adopting this framework reduces the travel time by 55 minutes but increases the cost by US$ 0.176 compared to fast charging for a 400 km trip. We can conclude that EVs with main traction and add-on batteries provide a tradeoff between cost and time and are beneficial for both EV user and add-on battery charging and swapping station (ABCSS) operators.