This article is the first in our 2026 Policy Series, which examines the key policy issues shaping the future of bidirectional charging and vehicle-to-grid (V2G). As the technology moves beyond pilots, policy has emerged as the primary constraint on scale. Future features will explore other emerging regulatory and market issues facing the industry.
As bidirectional charging moves from pilot projects toward early commercialization, the conversation is broadening beyond resilience and backup power toward the role electric vehicles can play in everyday grid operations. Behind-the-meter applications (BTM) such as vehicle-to-home (V2H) and vehicle-to-building (V2B) deliver clear customer value and may scale in markets where resilience, bill management, or load control are primary objectives. These use cases demonstrate that bidirectional EVs can function as flexible energy assets, even when they operate entirely behind the retail meter.
During normal grid operations, V2H and V2B can reduce or shift on-site electricity demand, particularly during periods of system stress. By lowering net load behind the meter, these applications can contribute to peak demand reduction, ease local distribution constraints, and reduce system costs without requiring power to be exported to the grid. In this way, behind-the-meter bidirectional charging can provide both private benefits to customers and indirect benefits to the broader system.
At the same time, additional system and societal value emerges when bidirectional EVs are able to export power beyond the retail meter and are compensated for doing so. Export capability allows EVs to move beyond load reduction and operate as dispatchable supply resources, supporting neighboring customers, addressing localized grid constraints, and contributing to grid reliability and flexibility at times and locations where the need is greatest.
A key distinction between these use cases lies in the magnitude and flexibility of the resource that can be delivered. In V2H or V2B configurations, the contribution to the grid is inherently limited by the customer’s on-site load at any given moment. By contrast, V2G enables the full rated capacity of a bidirectional EVSE (electric vehicle supply equipment) to be dispatched when conditions warrant, allowing EVs to provide larger, more predictable kW contributions and to participate more directly in grid operations.
From backup power to grid resource
Most early residential bidirectional deployments have emphasized resilience through islanded operation, not parallel grid interaction. The first widely available commercial bidirectional offering in the U.S., introduced by Ford with the F-150 Lightning and supported by Sunrun’s Home Integration System, was designed to operate exclusively in islanded mode. In that configuration, the vehicle disconnects from the grid during an outage and supplies power to the home as a backup generator replacement.
This approach was deliberate. Islanded operation avoids many of the technical, safety, and regulatory complexities associated with exporting power or operating in parallel with the grid. It also aligned with early customer value propositions focused on outage resilience rather than grid services.
By contrast, parallel operation, where a bidirectional EV remains grid-connected and actively manages household load or power flows under normal operating conditions, is only now beginning to be explored through new programs and pilots. In these configurations, V2B can reduce a home’s net load during peak periods, support bill management, and increase on-site solar self-consumption by absorbing midday generation and offsetting evening demand. These uses deliver meaningful value without exporting power beyond the meter, but they are fundamentally different from islanded backup operation and should be treated as such in policy and program design.
What changes the equation is capacity. A bidirectional EVSE is typically capable of 7 kilowatts or more, often exceeding the instantaneous load of many homes. That means a single EV can simultaneously serve household demand and export surplus power to the grid during periods of system stress. In effect, the EV becomes a flexible, dispatchable distributed energy resource, not just a backup battery on wheels.
Yet despite all the hype about a “two-way grid,” exports from electric vehicles are not allowed in most jurisdictions today, leaving bidirectional charging confined largely to behind-the-meter applications.
Why solar dominates behind-the-meter exports
The reason is historical. Behind-the-meter exports were not created as a general-purpose grid service. They emerged as a policy tool to support distributed clean energy development, specifically rooftop solar. Net energy metering and related tariffs were designed to encourage investment in customer-sited generation by allowing excess production to flow onto the grid and receive credit.
Over time, this framework expanded modestly to include stationary batteries, but often with strict conditions. In many states, BTM batteries may export only if they are charged exclusively from on-site solar. The logic is clear: if export compensation is justified as a clean energy incentive, regulators want assurance that exported electrons are “clean.”
Electric vehicles complicate that logic. EVs are not generators. They are mobile storage assets that charge from many sources, home solar, workplace charging, public DC fast chargers, and the grid itself. Trying to force EVs into a solar-centric export paradigm creates artificial constraints that undermine their value as flexible grid resources.
The policy tension at the heart of V2G
This is where V2G runs headlong into a legacy policy framework. The original purpose of behind-the-meter export rules was to accelerate renewable generation. The emerging need is to support grid flexibility, reliability, and resilience in a system increasingly dominated by variable resources.
Those objectives are related, but they are not the same.
As electrification accelerates and peak demand grows, distribution systems need fast, dispatchable capacity that can respond to local conditions. Bidirectional EVs are uniquely well-suited to this role. They are already paid for by customers. They are widely distributed. And their availability often aligns with grid needs, particularly in the evening hours.
But realizing that value requires a shift in mindset: from treating exports as a reward for clean generation to treating exports as compensation for services provided to the grid.
Complications at the household level
The challenge is not just conceptual. It is operational. Homes are increasingly hosting multiple DERs, solar PV, stationary batteries, smart thermostats, and now EVs with bidirectional capability. Many of these resources participate in programs governed by different tariffs, incentives, and contractual obligations.
A household with net energy metering, a solar-charged battery, and a bidirectional EV can easily find itself subject to conflicting rules about when and how power may flow across the meter. In some cases, exporting from an EV could jeopardize eligibility for a solar tariff. In others, it could complicate settlement under a battery incentive program.
These are not reasons to avoid V2G. They are reasons to adopt a more holistic, whole-home approach to DER policy, one that focuses on outcomes rather than technology silos.
Early examples point the way forward
A handful of programs are beginning to test this more flexible approach. In New York, the Value of Distributed Energy Resources (VDER) framework allows certain storage and flexible resources to be compensated for the locational and system value they provide, rather than their technology type alone. While complex, it represents a step toward performance-based valuation.
California’s Emergency Load Reduction Program (ELRP) has demonstrated that customer-sited resources, including EVs, can reliably export power during grid emergencies when properly incentivized. And in Massachusetts, Connected Solutions has shown that behind-the-meter resources can be aggregated and dispatched at scale to meet system needs.
None of these programs is perfect, and none was designed specifically for V2G. But collectively, they provide early evidence that export-capable EVs can be integrated into existing regulatory structures when policymakers are willing to prioritize grid value over rigid classifications.
Revising the export paradigm
If V2G is to scale meaningfully, regulators will need to revisit some foundational assumptions. Chief among them is the idea that behind-the-meter exports must be tightly linked to on-site generation. In a grid increasingly defined by flexibility constraints rather than energy scarcity, that assumption no longer holds.
This does not mean abandoning clean energy goals. On the contrary, enabling EVs to export power can reduce reliance on fossil peakers, support higher penetrations of renewables, and lower system costs. But it does mean acknowledging that the value of exports lies in when and where power is delivered, not solely in how it was produced.
Bidirectional charging sits at the intersection of electrification, distributed energy, and grid modernization. Keeping it trapped behind one-way rules designed for a different era will limit its impact. Unlocking its full value requires allowing EVs to participate as true grid resources, capable of exporting power, being compensated for services, and operating alongside other DERs under coherent, whole-home frameworks.
This first article in our 2026 Policy Series makes the case that export capability is not a peripheral feature of V2G. It is the feature. And until policy catches up with that reality, bidirectional EVs will remain underutilized assets in a grid that increasingly needs exactly what they can provide.
