General Motors promotes GM Energy, energy management for EV customers

Automaker giant General Motors wants businesses and electric vehicle owners to make use of GM Energy, a new effort that will maximize energy management services. It looks like GM wants to connect homes and businesses with EV chargers to create optimized energy storage that can benefit the towns EV owners currently live and work in.

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GM hopes the Ultium Home, Ultium Commercial, and Ultium Charge 360 platforms will help customers with integrated energy management that can help mitigate the effects of power outages. The company also will work with SunPower, a leading US solar technology company, along with other companies interested in providing energy solutions while receiving product and service offerings in return.

As stated by Travis Hester, VP of EV growth operations at GM: "The reliability of the U.S. electrical power grid has never been more important. GM Energy has the opportunity to help deliver sustainable energy products and services that can help mitigate the effect of power outages and provide customers with resilient and cost-effective energy management."

The company noted that GM Energy wants to offer its full suite of energy products and services beyond the vehicle, as the auto industry prepares for an all-electric future. When there is an unexpected power outage, EV owners could use their car - or a stationary storage box - to help provide power. These batteries also could be used to contribute energy back into the power grid under times of heavy stress.

As more electric cars hit our streets, there is growing research to see how these same vehicles could help prop up an overloaded energy grid. GM Energy and Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) will let residential customers use a bi-directional charger and their compatible EV for backup power if there is a short-term power outage.

This is a rather fascinating effort from GM, and it will be neat to see how EV technology advances to help their future efforts.