Scheduling charging of electric vehicles in a secured manner by emphasizing cost minimization using blockchain technology and IPFS

Abstract

In this work, Electric Vehicles (EVs) are charged using a new and improved charging mechanism called the Mobile-Vehicle-to-Vehicle (M2V) charging strategy. It is further compared with conventional Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Grid-to-Vehicle (G2V) charging strategies. In the proposed work, the charging of vehicles is done in a Peer-to-Peer (P2P) manner; the vehicles are charged using Charging Stations (CSs) or Mobile Vehicles (MVs) in the absence of a central entity. CSs are fixed entities situated at certain locations and act as charge suppliers, whereas MVs act as prosumers, which have the capability of charging themselves and also other vehicles. In the proposed system, blockchain technology is used to tackle the issues related with existing systems, such as privacy, security, lack of trust, etc., and also to promote transparency, data immutability, and a tamper-proof nature. Moreover, to store the data related to traffic, roads, and weather conditions, a centralized entity, i.e., Transport System Information Unit (TSIU), is used. It helps in reducing the road congestion and avoids roadside accidents. In the TSIU, an Inter-Planetary File System (IPFS) is used to store the data in a secured manner after removing the data's redundancy through data filtration. Furthermore, four different types of costs are calculated mathematically, which ultimately contribute towards calculating the total charging cost. The shortest distance between a vehicle and the charging entities is calculated using the Great-Circle Distance formula. Moving on, both the time taken to traverse this shortest distance and the time to charge the vehicles are calculated using real-time data of four EVs. Location privacy is also proposed in this work to provide privacy to vehicle users. The power flow and the related energy losses for the above-mentioned charging strategies are also discussed in this work. An incentive provisioning mechanism is also proposed on the basis of timely delivery of credible messages, which further promotes users' participation. In the end, simulations are performed and results are obtained that prove the efficiency of the proposed work, as compared to conventional techniques, in minimizing the EVs' charging cost, time, and distance.