Research

Electric cars, ships, and their charging infrastructure – A comprehensive review

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Abstract

The environmental concerns and reduction in fossil fuels have become a major concern due to which a large number of electric and hybrid vehicles are being built to minimize the contribution of greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector and to increase the efficiency of the overall vehicles. Electric vehicles (EVs) play an important role in today’s development of smarter cities and hence, there is a rapid growth of EVs all around the globe. Although they are found to be environmentally friendly and energy-efficient in comparison with internal combustion engine vehicles but lack of availability of a large number of charging stations at present time limits the use of EVs in the wider perspective. The broader use of EVs would require a huge amount of power from the existing power grids that may hit the prevailing distribution system. Further, charging such EVs equipped with huge battery packs, high power charging stations are essential to charge them at a speed comparable to the conventional oil/gas refueling system. The EVs considered in this study restricts to electric ships and electric cars being two major contributors towards greenhouse gas emissions. In order to address the aforementioned concerns, this study, therefore, presents state-of-the-art based on conventional and current technologies relating to EVs and their charging infrastructure. Further, possible configurations based on the integration of renewable energy sources and stationary energy storage systems are presented to aid the existing power grids. Lastly, challenges along with possible solutions and the future perspective are part of this study.