Ford EV Trucks: Can two-way charging lower your electric bill?
By Kristin Toussaint | Published: 2025-10-28 12:01:00 | Source: Fast Company – news
As more and more drivers buy electric cars, some people have expressed concerns about how the electric car boom will be achieved More pressure Our old and stressed power grid. More electric vehicles mean greater demand for electricity, which may require costly infrastructure upgrades or limiting when drivers can charge if demand is too high.
But one of the things that has long been talked about about the promise of electric vehicles is that they could make our electricity grid more resilient. With bi-directional charging, EVs can essentially act as batteries parked outside your home, powering homes so they don’t need to rely on outside electricity.
They can also send power back to the grid.
Few electric vehicles can do that Really power your home During a power outage, including a Ford F-150 Lightning. Ford is expanding how drivers of its electric vehicles can benefit from two-way charging
Through the Home Energy Management program, F-150 Lightning owners can use their trucks to power their homes when electricity rates from the grid are high, easing energy burdens and saving people money on their monthly bills.
It also gives customers the ability to send power from trucks to the grid, and in some cases earns them money from their electric company for doing so.
“We see an opportunity here where our vehicles can be part of the solution rather than exacerbating the problem,” Dave McCready, Ford’s director of electric vehicle network integration strategy and business development, said during a recent press conference about the program.
The rollout is currently limited, but Ford expects to expand the home energy management pilot program in 2026.
As electric vehicle sales lag and EV tax credits expire — and as homeowners across the country see their energy bills increase — Ford hopes potential customers will see these features as another benefit of owning an electric vehicle.
Personal power station to reduce energy bills
Standby power has been a feature of the F-150 Lightning since its 2022 launch.
After major hurricanes like Helen in North Carolina and Beryl in Texas, F-150 Lightning owners used their trucks as generators, allowing them to keep the lights on and the refrigerator running when the power went out. A fully charged F-150 Lightning can power a home for three days; If this energy is rationed, it can last up to 10 days.
Backup power only works when the grid is down. However, Home Energy Management allows EV owners to use their trucks to power their homes even when the grid is on.
The idea is that customers can charge their electric vehicles overnight during peak hours, when electricity prices are low. Then, when demand rises and prices rise, they can use their electric cars to power their homes.
This offsets the homeowner’s electricity bills and frees energy from the grid to go elsewhere. The automaker explains that the home in question is now essentially “invisible” to the network.
In June 2024, Ford partnered with Baltimore Gas & Electric (BGE) and Sunrun, a home solar and battery company, to launch the nation’s first home-access vehicle. Demo programallowing electric vehicle owners to use their cars to power their homes at any time, not just during a power outage.
Brian Foreman, owner of an F-150 Lightning in Highland, Maryland, was the first customer to do so, converting his electric car into his own. Personal power plant.
Ford wouldn’t reveal exactly how much Foreman has saved on electricity bills, but he says customers can save an average of $42 a month, or $500 a year, by using drive-thru.
“When most people worry, ‘I have an electric car, my electric bill is going to go up,’ well, now you have that compensation. Your car is actually working for you in your driveway while you park it,” said Ryan O’Gorman, senior director of energy services business strategy and delivery at Ford.
Send energy to the grid and make money
In summer 2025Forman joined two other BGE customers for another pilot, this time allowing customers to use F-150 Lightnings to send power to the grid.
This turns EVs into “distributed power plants” for each utility company, which also pays customers for the energy they share.
Instead of just saving customers money on electric bills, this next step in Ford’s home energy management program allows electric vehicle owners to make money with their electric vehicles. Participants can earn up to $1,000 for the energy they provided between July and September
Using F-150 Lightning to power your home during peak power demand or to send power to the grid requires additional equipment: an inverter called a Home Integration System, created by Ford and Sunrun.
This equipment is also needed if you want to use your truck to provide backup power during a power outage, so some customers have already installed it. Home integration system Costs $3,895, and installation can cost another $3,000, though these prices vary
These expenses are in addition to the price of purchasing and installing a home EV charger. Some Ford customers got a free charger and installation through the automaker’s Ford Power Promise program, but for those who missed out on that opportunity, the Ford Charge Station Pro Level 2 costs another $1,310 plus installation, which can range from $200 to $1,000, depending on any wiring upgrades your home needs.
This means there is an upfront cost to eventually be able to offset your energy bills or make money by saving energy through your electric vehicle. But Ford says the F-150 Lightning is cost-competitive for a 10-kilowatt static backup generator for your home — plus one you can drive.
Looking forward to Ford
Currently, a handful of customers in just nine states are using Ford’s home energy management capabilities, including Maryland, Georgia (where Ford ran a six-month pilot program with energy provider Southern Company focused on commercial fleets), and Vermont (where energy expert Peter Schneider tested the program with Ford, using it to power his home, and reduce grid stress, during the extreme heat there last summer).
Setting up this system requires working with utility companies, which must provide approval and permits to connect electric vehicles to the grid in these ways.
Automakers are also working with utilities to communicate peak demand, through software that automatically charges an electric vehicle at times that are convenient for the grid.
“For Ford trying to maintain communications with hundreds and even thousands of electric utilities across the country is an untenable business solution,” McCready said. “We found that other automakers were facing the same problem.”
Ford worked with BMW and Honda to create chargescapea joint venture launched in 2024, which essentially acts as a “connective tissue,” as McCready explained, to connect utilities and automakers, and integrate electric vehicles into the grid.
Although vehicle-to-home and vehicle-to-grid charging is a goal for the electric vehicle industry overall, Ford says it’s ahead of the curve with its recent pilot programs.
Ford and Michigan-based DTE Energy also recently launched a new program to pilot drive-to-home capabilities, starting with a group of 15 Ford employees.
Through this pilot program, DTE Energy will pay participants to use their electric vehicles to power their homes during times of high electricity demand. But EV owners don’t have to do anything themselves; The system is fully automated.
DTE Energy will send notifications to ChargeScape to determine when participants will have EVs available for their homes. Although it’s only available to Ford employees right now, the automaker says it’s working with DTE to hopefully expand the program to the general public later in 2026.
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(Tags for translation)electric cars
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