Understanding the impact of weather conditions on the future electrified transportation and distribution grids: a case study of northeast UK under heatwave scenarios

To advance towards achieving net-zero emissions targets, governments around the world have established ambitious objectives to accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs). However, this shift presents significant challenges for the energy sector, particularly the electricity grid. Climate change and extreme weather conditions can exacerbate these challenges. Understanding the impacts of extreme weather is essential for implementing appropriate mitigation strategies, ensuring the adoption of new technologies, such as EVs, can be as effective as possible. This paper examines the impact of EV charging on the electricity grid, focusing on how extreme weather conditions, such as heatwaves, can alter this impact. A model combining lattice Monte Carlo simulations with a roulette wheel mechanism was used to generate diverse EV charging profiles for a high-voltage distribution grid in the North-East UK, projected for 2040. Using the most recent heatwave data, the potential impact of heatwaves was modeled through averaging several scenarios with different severities that impacted the inputs distributions of the proposed algorithms. Case studies revealed that heatwaves have the potential to increase peak demand at specific grid locations, necessitating new strategies for grid management.