After a slow start, the number of electric cars on our roads is accelerating although battery storage will be a key driver, writes Anthony Harrington

The age of the electric car has had any number of false dawns, but as a recent report from Transport & Environment notes, the electric car is now on what looks like an unstoppable trajectory. In 2015, the number of electric vehicles in Europe finally moved past the highly significant one per cent barrier, as far as the total of new cars sold across Europe was concerned.

This is the number that many regard as the minimum critical mass required to get governments and local authorities swinging their weight behind efforts to provide the necessary "refuelling" infrastructure people require.

Running out of battery power is not a disaster if you are driving a hybrid vehicle which can just switch seamlessly to its alternative mode, but it is a disaster in a pure electric car.

If this is indeed the beginning of a real move that will see electric motors replacing the internal combustion engine, renewables could have a great role to play.

Ralph Spernagel, Construction Director at the renewables consultancy, Natural Power, points out that the timing is good from the standpoint of renewables making a contribution to an increase in electricity demand associated with rising numbers of electric vehicles on UK roads.

"The wider industry understands renewables a lot better now than it did, say, ten years ago. There is a much greater understanding between the various electricity system operators and the developer community," he says.

Moreover, Spernagel says that there are plans afoot to introduce more competition into the grid connectivity side of things.

In Scotland right now you apply either to SSE,Scottish Power or National Grid, and for many projects, the wait for connection could be three to four years and even longer in some parts of the country.

"Grid costs can vary enormously. If you are looking at a large scale project, where you have to reinforce the local distribution or wider transmission network to be able to handle your output, the grid connection costs could be a very significant part of your total project budget. The cost though, is always very site specific, depending on where you are relative to the grid nodes," he adds.

Right now Natural Power do not see many requests that are specifically transport related, but rather are focused on the development of renewable electricity and heat in the wider sense.

The main business challenge to the industry is driving efficiency into projects, particularly onshore wind and establishing a route to market for their electricity in a post-subsidy energy market.

The other big area, he says, is renewable heat, and they are seeing high demand for consultancy on potential schemes, as it is a major sector in our energy landscape where there has only been limited historic progress against current targets. On transport, he sees renewables providing power to electricity storage systems at motorway stops as a very exciting development that could roll out in the years ahead.

"I think joint ventures, and motorway stops with battery storage to provide efficient top ups for electric cars are well worth thinking about. You want to collocate storage systems, where possible, relatively close to where you are going to see strong demand and if you can set up direct arrangements with more remotely located renewable electricity developers feeding those systems via the grid network, that could be very attractive," he adds.

Spernagel expects to see battery storage projects ramp up over the next 18 months, with or without a transport dimension to them.

"There is a huge amount of background studies and planning being done on storage and some very innovative research about how to integrate and manage these systems with renewables, so this is a fast moving field," he says.

Dave Anderson, Managing Director of VG Consulting makes the point that whatever contribution renewable generation makes in the switch over to electric cars – if that switch happens, the grid and mainstream power will continue to play a major role.

"It is absolutely correct that battery technology and improvements in battery storage will be fundamental to renewables playing any role in transport. However, people clearly want to use cars when there is no wind, as well as when there is wind, so much of the charging of cars will come direct from the grid," he notes.

However, Anderson emphasises that technology is moving fast right across the generation spectrum.

One of the big stumbling blocks to the deployment of wind farms in urban areas, he points out, is the disruption they cause to radar – which is why Glasgow only has one wind farm in the metropolitan area.

However, technological innovations are getting round the fact that currently tall wind turbines create false echoes that look like aircraft on a radar screen.

"The truth is that renewable generation is headed in the right direction and constant technological improvement to all aspects of renewables, from turbines to batteries, will make it more important. Everyone would like to get away from being reliant on subsidies.

"However, all our technology comes from Europe and we should really be developing our own here in the UK and in Scotland."

One of the reasons why onshore wind continues to be so important, despite the Conservative manifesto pledge, is that much of the electricity grid is old and there are real difficulties in many areas in going from a local area to the grid.

"Offshore wind developers need onshore wind to be making the grid connections they can tie into. This is one of the things that is going to make it viable for offshore generated power to reach the grid in a cost effective fashion," he argues.