Vehicle-to-grid technology is slowly expanding, with more automakers and power companies starting to offer the functionality. Ford, Sunrun and the Baltimore Gas and Electric Company have partnered with three F-150 Lightning owners to use V2G tech to shore up the state’s power grid.
Ford Authority reports the partnership started back in 2022 when Sunrun teamed up with Ford to install the automaker’s 80-amp Charge Station Pro home integration systems in the homes of F-150 Lightning owners. When using the Lightning’s Intelligent Backup Power feature, the Charge Station Pro can power a home for three days, or 10 days if you combine it with solar power.
The three companies are again partnering on a new initiative that will see three Lightning owners who live in BGE’s market share power with the grid over the course of three months, as a release from Sunrun explains:
Sunrun is networking and monitoring the enrolled F-150 Lightning trucks as they share stored energy during dispatch windows from June 1 to September 30, 2024, between the hours of 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays. All funding will flow to enrolled customers, who will receive a payment based on the amount of energy shared—estimated to be $800 over the four months of the program.
Said Maryland state delegate David Fraser-Hidalgo about the tech:
The ability of Ford’s F-150 Lightning to support the electric grid and generate revenue for the owner while parked at home is a game-changing moment for electric vehicles in Maryland and nationwide as other manufacturers will follow.
Sunrun says data collected from the initiative will allow the companies to learn about the behaviors of EV owners and expand the program by offering incentives to other Lightning owners. This isn’t the first time a state government has tested something like this out, either. In 2022, North Carolina’s Duke Energy did the same thing. The program cost half a million dollars and was available to 100 Duke customers who were also Lightning owners.
It should be noted that while this is game changing tech, it’s an expensive endeavor not everyone will be able to take advantage of. Ford’s Charge Station Pro requires the Lighting be equipped with the extended-range battery, which you can get for no less than $68,000 starting with the Lightning Flash; the extended range battery isn’t available on the base Lighting XLT. Then there’s the Charge Station Pro itself, which is just over $1,300. Installation for that varies, but a quick search shows some homeowners have been quoted $2,640 to as high as just over $6,100.
Then there’s the requirement of the Sunrun Home Integration system, which some have said can cost as low as $10,000 all the way up to $32,000. MotorTrend was quoted $18,000 when they looked at installing the system on a home. With those high costs, energy companies are going to have come up with a little more than a few hundred bucks to pay these owners.