On the Optimality of Procrastination Policy for EV charging under Net Energy Metering

Abstract: We consider the problem of behind-the-meter EV charging by a prosumer, co-optimized with rooftop solar, electric battery, and flexible consumptions such as water heaters and HVAC. Under the time-of-use net energy metering tariff with the stochastic solar production and random EV charging demand, a finite-horizon surplus-maximization problem is formulated. We show that a procrastination threshold policy that delays EV charging to the last possible moment is optimal when EV charging is co-optimized with flexible demand, and the policy thresholds can be computed easily offline. When battery storage is part of the co-optimization, it is shown that the net consumption of the prosumer is a two-threshold piecewise linear function of the behind-the-meter renewable generation under the optimal policy, and the procrastination threshold policy remains optimal, although the thresholds cannot be computed easily. We propose a simple myopic solution and demonstrate in simulations that the performance gap between the myopic policy and an oracle upper bound appears to be 0.5-7.5%.