V2G Revenue & Energy Flow Estimator | Net Revenue After Battery Degradation

V2G Revenue & Energy Flow Estimator

What would selling power back from your car actually earn? After what the charging cost you, and after what it takes out of the battery — the two things almost every V2G calculator leaves out.

Your car

The usable figure, not the gross one
kWh
Leave enough to drive on — see the depth limit in Advanced
kWh
Advanced / Custom Input — the vehicle
The tool caps your export at this share of the battery.
%
Decides how long each export session takes.
kW
You lose some of every unit that goes in and comes back out.
%

What you are paid, and what you pay

Filled in from your country — use your programme’s real rate
/kWh
Your cheapest overnight rate
/kWh
Advanced / Custom Input — the programme
Some programmes charge a monthly subscription. 0 if yours does not.
/month
Some programmes pay just for being plugged in and available.
/month

How often would you do it?

nos
Advanced / Custom Input — the pattern
Allow for holidays and any months the programme is not running.
weeks
After any grant. Typical range is a good deal more than a normal charger.
Taken straight off the hardware cost.

What it costs the battery

This is the part most calculators skip, and it is usually the difference between a profit and a loss.

LFP lasts roughly three times as many cycles as NMC
Filled in from the chemistry and battery size
cycles
Advanced / Custom Input — the wear model
Per kWh moved. Overrides the pack figures above. 0 to ignore.
/kWh
A cycle is energy in and energy out, so by default both count.

Result

Put in your car, your rates and how often you would do it, then press “Work out what it earns”.

Estimate only — not a guarantee of earnings and not warranty advice. Verify against your own tariff, your programme’s terms and your manufacturer’s warranty before relying on this.

Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) Revenue & Energy Flow Estimator

Search for a vehicle to grid revenue calculator and almost every result shows you gross earnings only, energy exported multiplied by the export price, nothing taken off. That’s not what actually lands in your pocket. This tool subtracts the two things most calculators conveniently leave out, the electricity you had to buy to put that energy in (with round-trip losses counted honestly) and the battery wear cost itself, modelled from the pack’s real purchase price and cycle life rather than a guessed figure. On a typical worked case, battery degradation alone eats close to a quarter of the gross margin, and swapping an LFP pack for a premium NMC one can flip a real annual profit into an annual loss, so this tool shows that plainly instead of hiding it inside an optimistic headline number. Built for EV owners, electricians and energy consultants comparing v2g battery degradation cost against real bidirectional charger payback across 13 countries.

How to Use

Step 1: Pick your region
  • Choose your country from the region dropdown (USA, UK, UAE, Australia, Germany and more). This loads realistic starting export rates, charging rates and V2G programme availability status for your market, since not every country has active V2G programmes running yet.
Step 2: Enter your battery and export details
  • Fill in your battery’s usable size in kWh (not the gross spec-sheet number) and how much energy you’d send back to the grid per session. In Advanced, set the deepest discharge you’d allow for V2G (most owners cap this around 40%, so the car still has enough charge to actually drive), the fastest rate your charger can push power out and your round-trip efficiency, since you always lose some energy on the way in and back out again.
Step 3: Enter the two prices that decide everything
  • Type what your V2G programme pays you per kWh exported, and what you pay per kWh to charge, usually your cheapest overnight rate. The gap between these two numbers is the entire business case for V2G and this tool makes that gap visible rather than burying it. In Advanced you can also add a monthly programme fee or an availability payment if your programme has either.
Step 4: Set how often you’d actually do this
  • Enter how many export sessions you’d run a week and how many weeks a year you’d realistically take part (allowing for holidays or months the programme pauses). This is what turns a per-session number into a believable annual figure instead of an inflated best-case one.
Step 5: Add your bidirectional charger cost
  • Enter what the bidirectional charger costs you after any grant or incentive. Bidirectional chargers cost meaningfully more than a normal home charger and this field is what the tool uses later to work out a real payback period in years.
Step 6: Choose your battery chemistry
  • Select LFP or NMC from the dropdown, this one choice changes your wear cost more than any other single input, since LFP typically manages three to five times as many full cycles as NMC. The tool auto-fills a representative pack cost and cycle life for your choice, both of which you can override directly if you know your actual car’s figures, or set a flat wear cost per kWh yourself if you’d rather skip the pack-based model entirely.
Step 7: Tap Calculate and read the full picture
  • The tool returns a clear verdict (it pays, wear eats most of it, slow on the hardware, or it loses money), a full revenue-to-net breakdown showing exactly what charging cost and battery wear each take out of the gross figure, a spread sensitivity table showing how the annual result changes if the price gap narrows or widens, a side by side LFP versus NMC comparison on your own numbers and the charger’s break-even point in both years and in export cycles.

Key Features

  • Net earnings, not gross. Every result is shown after subtracting charging cost (with round-trip losses) and battery degradation, so the final number is what actually ends up in your pocket, not an inflated headline figure almost every other V2G calculator shows instead.
  • Degradation modelled from real pack economics, not guessed. The wear cost comes from the published formula, pack cost divided by battery size divided by cycle life, which reproduces the commonly quoted 0.05 to 0.10 per kWh wear figure instead of making one up.
  • LFP vs NMC comparison, side by side. Because chemistry changes cycle life by a factor of three, the tool runs your exact same usage pattern through both chemistries and shows you the different annual outcome each one produces, this single input often matters more than any tariff decision.
  • Spread sensitivity table. The gap between what you’re paid to export and what you pay to charge is recalculated at half, three-quarters, 1.5 times and double your current spread, so you can see exactly how close you are to the point where V2G stops paying at all.
  • Depth-of-discharge cap built in. The tool automatically limits how much energy can be exported based on the maximum discharge depth you set, so the numbers reflect a real, safe usage pattern rather than an unrealistic full-battery drain every session.
  • Charger payback in both years and cycles. The bidirectional charger’s net cost (after any grant) is divided by your annual net earnings to show payback in years, and by your per-session net to show it in the number of export cycles, two different ways of judging the same investment.
  • An honest battery-health note. Rather than taking either side of the “does V2G damage your battery” argument, the tool includes the actual peer-reviewed finding, that bidirectional operation used batteries roughly ten times harder yet added only about 1.24 to 1.27 percent extra total degradation, because the lower average charge level during V2G partly offsets normal calendar aging.

Formula / Logic Used

Exported energy, capped by your depth-of-discharge limit

Ec=min⁡(E,B×D)Ec = \min(E, B \times D)

Revenue per export session

Rv=Ec×PxRv = Ec \times Px

Electricity needed to replace what was exported (after round-trip loss)

Ci=EcηCi = \frac{Ec}{\eta}

Charging cost per session

Cc=Ci×PcCc = Ci \times Pc

Gross margin per session

G=Rv−CcG = Rv – Cc

Battery wear cost per kWh (published pack-cost model)

W=PkB×NcW = \frac{Pk}{B \times Nc}

Degradation cost per session

Dg=(Ec+Ci)×WDg = (Ec + Ci) \times W

Net earnings per session

Nt=G−DgNt = G – Dg

Annual net earnings

Na=Nt×(Cw×Wy)−FyNa = Nt \times (Cw \times Wy) – Fy

Bidirectional charger payback period

Py=Hc−InNaPy = \frac{Hc – In}{Na}

Who Should Use This Tool

EV owners deciding whether to sign up for a vehicle-to-grid programme, electricians and energy consultants sizing bidirectional charger investments for clients, and anyone comparing bidirectional charger payback against a simple home solar or TOU tariff setup across V2G markets like the US, UK and Australia.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. Is vehicle-to-grid actually worth it, or does it just wear out my battery?

It depends mostly on the gap between your export price and charging price, and on your battery chemistry. On a typical LFP setup with a reasonable price spread it can earn a real net profit after wear, but a premium NMC pack with a narrow spread can genuinely lose money, which is exactly why this tool shows both outcomes honestly.

2. How much does V2G actually damage an EV battery?

Peer-reviewed research found that bidirectional charging used batteries roughly ten times harder in terms of cycling, yet only added about 1.24 to 1.27 percent extra total degradation over normal smart charging, because V2G sessions keep the average state of charge lower, which reduces everyday calendar aging and partly cancels out the extra cycling.

3. What’s the difference between gross and net V2G earnings?

Gross earnings are just the energy you exported multiplied by the export price. Net earnings subtract what it cost you to recharge that energy (including round-trip losses) and the battery wear cost of cycling the pack, which together can take a quarter or more off the gross figure.

4. Does LFP or NMC make more sense for V2G?

LFP batteries typically last three to five times as many full cycles as NMC, so their wear cost per kWh is much lower, which usually makes V2G earnings stronger on an LFP pack. NMC can still work, but needs a wider price spread to overcome its shorter cycle life.

5. How long does a bidirectional charger take to pay for itself with V2G?

Divide its net cost (after any grant) by your expected annual net V2G earnings. On typical worked numbers this lands somewhere around 6 to 8 years, though it changes a lot with your price spread, how many sessions you run, and which battery chemistry you have.

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