Understanding the potential of vehicle-to-grid chargers

Publication date: November 2025

Vehicle-to-grid (V2G) chargers are two-way chargers that allow electric vehicles to both draw electricity from and return electricity to the grid. When parked and plugged in, an EV can store electricity in its battery during off-peak periods and feed it back into a home, business or the wider network when demand is high. 

EECA is conducting a vehicle-to-grid (V2G) trial centred on Queenstown to better understand how this technology works and how households and businesses can use it effectively in New Zealand.

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About the Vehicle-to-grid trial

EECA’s V2G trial aims to understand more about two-way chargers, including: 

  • What’s required to enable them to interact with the electricity system. 
  • How they interact with the electricity system, including responding to electricity price changes and times of peak demand.  
  • How they can add value for a variety of homes and businesses. 
  • How people will engage with and use them. 

The findings will help build an evidence base to inform future policies and guidance that enable V2G to be rolled out effectively across New Zealand.

Understanding how Vehicle-to-grid technology can benefit Aotearoa 

Understanding how V2G technology can work for Aotearoa technically, economically, and for consumers, is essential as EV uptake grows and electricity demand increases. 

The flexibility offered by V2G technology can: 

  • Help reduce peak electricity demand and reduce strain on transmission and distribution networks, reducing the need for costly upgrades to the network of poles and wires. 
  • Enhance energy resilience and long-term energy security by making more efficient use of the infrastructure (poles and wires) we already have. 
  • Lower costs for energy users by allowing charging when electricity is cheaper and the exporting of any surplus electricity when the price is high.  
  • Help EV owners to get the most value from the powerful batteries they already have in their cars. 
  • Help to keep households powered up during network outages and extreme weather events. 

EECA research shows home charging is the main way people charge their EVs. This means there is potential to use parked vehicles for energy storage while they are charging at home. 

Read our EV charging research

How the V2G trial will work 

EECA plans to install an initial tranche of fewer than 10 V2G chargers in Queenstown. If successful, we will expand the trial to around 30-40 chargers across a mix of homes and businesses. We plan to: 

  • Complete installations during 2026. 
  • Collect detailed technical and behavioural data over a period of one year. 
  • Publish insights as the project progresses, with a final report upon completion in late 2027.

EECA is working in partnership with Rewiring Aotearoa, who are supporting participant recruitment through their Queenstown Electrification Accelerator (QEA).  

You can learn more or register interest through QEA’s website: Vehicle To Grid Trial | QEA(external link) 

This page will be updated regularly with our findings and reports from the project.

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