What do I need?

What do you need for bidirectional charging? Here a short overview.

Car and charger

Of course, you’ll need a car and charger that are both capable of bidirectional charging and compatible with each other. You may already own an EV or be considering getting one. Nowadays, there is a wide variety of second-hand cars available.

We don’t offer advice on which car to choose, so please refer to our charger–car compatibility overview for guidance.

An electricity contract with agile pricing

The software is optimised for dynamic pricing, so a contract with agile (also known as dynamic) prices—updated every 60, 30, or even 15 minutes—is the best option. There’s no need to rush, however: you can start with V2G Liberty and switch to a dynamic contract at a later stage.

In the Netherlands, several suppliers offer these contracts, including Greenchoice, Pure Energie, Frank Energie, Eneco, Vattenfall, ANWB, Tibber, Zonneplan, and Energy Zero (most of which are listed as pre-configured settings in V2G Liberty). Across most European countries, suppliers provide dynamic price contracts based on the EPEX market. In Great Britain, Octopus Energy offers such contracts, while in Australia, Amber Energy provides half-hourly pricing.

Hardware for Home Assistant

The most popular choice for running Home Assistant is a Raspberry Pi microcomputer. It’s affordable, energy-efficient, and designed to operate 24/7. Other options are also available; Home Assistant provides an overview of recommended hardware and detailed installation instructions.

If you have an old, unused computer, this is a great opportunity to repurpose it. Home Assistant doesn’t require a powerful processor, so most older machines will work well. For best results, install Linux rather than Microsoft Windows. Windows uses more resources and may perform automatic updates that disrupt Home Assistant’s operation. Keep in mind that this hardware will run continuously, so low energy consumption is ideal.

The V2G Liberty App

Once you’ve activated and configured Home Assistant, you can install and configure the V2G Liberty app. The process is straightforward—just follow the step-by-step installation guide on GitHub.

SmartSchedules

FlexMeasures generates the optimised SmartSchedules for your setup. While you can host your own instance (it’s open source), most users opt for the managed instance provided by V2G Liberty.

For €200 per year, you receive unlimited SmartSchedules and 30 minutes of free online support. Your subscription fee directly supports this open-source project. If you’d like to use this managed service, please contact us—we can usually set up your account within one working day.

Happy 🚘 ← ⚡ → 🏡 charging!