A comprehensive framework is presented for the integration of electrified transportation and renewable energy through repurposing batteries of plug-in electric vehicles towards a sustainable energy future. The framework considers future market penetration scenarios of plug-in electric vehicles, availability of batteries at their vehicular end of life, and the storage capacity required to generate base-load wind power in the region of study. The objective is to develop a model that can be used as a policy tool to investigate how different scenarios and pertinent parameters can effectively meet the challenges of sustainability in the energy and transportation sectors when the ultimate goal is to simultaneously displace fossil fuels with new generation of low-cost intermittent renewable energy. A sample case study is performed for Canada to investigate and verify the performance of the model. The analysis shows that the proposed approach can further improve the energy sustainability performance of Canada in 2050 by 1.65–4.11%, depending on the confidence level and in addition to electrification of transportation. In the framework, a statistical algorithm is developed to calculate the capacity of an energy storage system required for delivering base-load electricity for a wind farm in the future electric grids. The algorithm contributes towards the goal of utilizing low- cost intermittent wind energy to base-load power generation in the future electric grids. The introduced algorithm presents three methods to perform the sizing calculations each representing a scenario associated with the stages of the wind energy industry. The results of the studied case are applied to estimate the cost of wind energy to produce rated power at different confidence levels, which show cost-effectiveness and less intermittency on the power systems allowing for larger penetrations of renewables. Advanced statistical methods are used to more accurately characterize the operational wind power output versus manufacturer’s power curve. This is essential for effective integration of wind power into the power systems. Four parametric and nonparametric models are applied to estimate the power curve of wind turbines based on the available operational wind power data. The results of this study suggest that the penalized spline regression method presents a better performance over the other analyzed methods. Finally, an experimental testing is performed in laboratory to show the proof of concept of the capacity degradation of used batteries of plug-in electric vehicles in stationary applications using a 25 kWh repurposed energy storage system obtained from a taxi fleet in their “as-is” condition. The proposed comprehensive framework herein presents an approach leading to a sustainable transportation system by providing low-cost renewable energy, and can be used as a gold standard to compare other policies like hydrogen energy technologies. / October 2015

In connection to the increasing awareness of vehicles and its impact on the environment, the interest in the electric vehicle market has shown a significant growth in the recent years. According to forecasts, it is also projected to increase further in the future. These electric vehicles are driven by lithium-ion batteries with an expected service life of 5-15 years depending on different technology generations and design concepts. After the given service life, the battery has lost approximately 20 percent of its capacity and is no longer permitted to be used in its original application area again, out of safety reasons. Although the retired battery pack is not suitable for vehicles, its remaining capacity can still be utilized in other applications. Hence, the term second life has become a common subject in the automotive industry, where companies are trying to find new application areas for the retired electric vehicle battery packs. Common methods regarding second life of electric vehicle batteries are processes such as remanufacturing, repurposing and re-use. These presented second life methods are from a reverse logistics perspective. Second life alternatives enable a better sustainability and reduces the environmental impact by re-using and recycling existing materials.   In this thesis, the authors examined different second life concepts with the same prerequisite, an electric vehicle lithium-ion battery pack with an energy capacity of 20 kWh. The project has been conducted in a company that is one of the leading manufacturers in the heavy-duty industrial vehicle industry, which currently is developing their electric vehicle machines. Several different concepts have been generated and analysed to find the most applicable business model concepts from a second life perspective. The purpose has been to investigate and calculate which of these business model concepts are most feasible from an economic and a reverse logistics perspective. In order to fulfil the purpose, the following research questions have been formulated:   RQ1: Which secondary use business model concepts are feasible for battery packs of electrified machines? RQ2: Out of the above identified concepts, which business model concept is economically feasible and how can its reverse logistic be composed?   In order to answer the research questions, the authors have analysed different cost aspects and forecasts based on existing research and case company data. This is performed to develop the most profitable concepts based on the collected data, where the generated ideas concluded in three final concepts. For these concepts, individual business model canvases were created to illustrate all important parts of the concepts. The thesis resulted in an economic analysis of the three concepts, visualizing function diagrams and comparing them to each other, to identify the most applicable concept for the case company. The remanufacturing concept proved to be the most applicable one, where its associated reverse logistics and recycling process were investigated and determined. In conclusion the thesis can firstly contribute to future research by the created process map that companies can use and apply in their second life process, correlated to the managerial implications. Secondly, the remanufacturing concept can be a potential future investment for the case company, considering all valuable factors that have been analysed throughout the thesis.     Keywords: Battery pack, Battery secondary use, Business model, Reverse logistic, ESS, Remanufacturing, Battery repurposing, re-use, Battery second life economic analysis.