STORAGE BATTERY MODULE RENTAL SYSTEM, RENTAL METHOD, AND RENTAL PROGRAM

• US 20190197608A1
• Filed: 10/29/2018
• Published: 06/27/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 12/27/2017
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha (Toyota Motor Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha (Toyota Motor Corporation)
• Inventors: IWAI, Satoshi, YAMADA, Koji, ISHIKAWA, Marie, SATO, Akinori, ISHIGAKI, Masanori, TOMURA, Shuji, GOTO, Shigeaki, KUSAKABE, Makoto, NISHI, Tomoki, SHICHI, Akira, YAMADA, Hiroyuki
• Granted Patent: US 10,846,786 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2250/16 by display
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/65 involving identification of vehicles or their battery types
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/665 Methods related to measuring, billing or payment
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/80 Exchanging energy storage elements, e.g. removable batteries
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 58/16 responding to battery ageing, e.g. to the number of charging cycles or the state of health [SoH]
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 31/382 Arrangements for monitoring battery or accumulator variables, e.g. SoC
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/08 Payment architectures
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0645 Rental transactions; Leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 15/006 dispensed for the electrical charging of other devices than vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 17/0014 for vending, access and use of specific services not covered anywhere else in G07F17/00 meter-controlled dispensing of liquid, gas or electricity G07F15/00
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 17/0057 for the hiring or rent of vehicles, e.g. cars, bicycles or wheelchairs car rental G07B15/00
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 2310/48 for electric vehicles [EV] or hybrid vehicles [HEV]
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 3/38 Arrangements for parallely feeding a single network by two or more generators, converters or transformers
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 3/381 Dispersed generators
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 7/00 Circuit arrangements for charging or depolarising batteries or for supplying loads from batteries
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 10/56 Power conversion systems, e.g. maximum power point trackers
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 10/76 Power conversion electric or electronic aspects
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/12 Electric charging stations
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/167 : Systems integrating technologies related to power network operation and communication or information technologies for supporting the interoperability of electric or hybrid vehicles, i.e. smartgrids as interface for battery charging of electric vehicles [EV] or hybrid vehicles [HEV]
• CPC Class Codes: Y04S 30/14 : Details associated with the interoperability, e.g. vehicle recognition, authentication, identification or billing

Abstract

A storage battery module rental system includes a storage battery module prepared in each providing point that is dispersedly distributed and that can be rented to a user, an acquisition unit configured to acquire individual information of a plurality of the users and module information from the storage battery module, the user being a rentee candidate of the storage battery module, a determining unit configured to determine an incentive given for renting the storage battery module based on the individual information and the module information in such a way that the incentive could differ for each user; and a notifying unit configured to notify the user of the incentive determined by the determining unit for each of the users.

Claims

1. A storage battery module rental system comprising:

a storage battery module prepared in each providing point that is dispersedly distributed and that can be rented to a user;

an acquisition unit configured to acquire individual information of a plurality of the users and module information from the storage battery module, the user being a rentee candidate of the storage battery module;

a determining unit configured to determine an incentive given for renting the storage battery module based on the individual information and the module information in such a way that the incentive could differ for each user; and

a notifying unit configured to notify the user of the incentive determined by the determining unit for each of the users.

2. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 1, wherein when the determining unit determines the incentive for renting one of the storage battery modules to the plurality of users, the determining unit compares the individual information of the users with each other to determine the incentive.

3. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 1, further comprising a power generation facility that is established so as to correspond to the providing point and that generates electric power as renewable energy for charging the storage battery module, wherein

the acquisition unit acquires power generation information related to an amount of power generated by the power generation facility, and

the determining unit determines the incentive given for renting the storage battery module based on the individual information, the module information, and the power generation information in such a way that the incentive could differ for each of the users.

4. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 1, further comprising a charging facility that is established at the providing point and that can adjust a charging speed to charge the storage battery module, wherein

the individual information includes information related to a rental time of the storage battery module that the user desires to rent, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of whether the charging facility needs to adjust the charging speed according to the rental time.

5. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 1, wherein

the individual information includes at least one of a return time and a return point at which the user desires to return the rented storage battery module, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of the return time and the return point.

6. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 1, wherein

the module information includes cost information about a cost for charging the storage battery module, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of the cost information.

7. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 1, wherein

the module information includes degradation information representing a level of degradation of the storage battery module, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of the degradation information.

8. The storage battery module according to claim 1, wherein

the storage battery module is detachably mounted on an electric vehicle as an energy source for traveling of the electric vehicle,

the individual information includes vehicle information of the electric vehicle, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of the vehicle information.

9. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 8, wherein

the vehicle information includes vehicle location information of the electric vehicle,

the module information includes providing point information of the providing point at which the storage battery module is prepared, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of a distance between the electric vehicle and the providing point calculated from the vehicle location information and the providing point information.

10. The storage battery module system according to claim 9, wherein

the vehicle information includes distance information indicating a distance that can be traveled by the electric vehicle with the storage battery module mounted on the electric vehicle, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of the distance between the electric vehicle and the providing point and the distance that can be traveled by the electric vehicle.

11. The storage battery module rental system according to claim 8, wherein

the vehicle information includes history information related to consumption of the storage battery module mounted on the electric vehicle in the past, and

the determining unit determines the incentive in consideration of the history information.

12. A storage battery module rental method comprising:

acquiring module information from a storage battery module prepared in each providing point that is dispersedly distributed and that can be rented to a user;

acquiring individual information of a plurality of the users, the user being a rentee candidate of the storage battery module;

determining an incentive given for renting the storage battery module based on the individual information and the module information in such a way that the incentive could differ for each user; and

notifying the user of the incentive determined by the determining unit for each of the users.

13. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing a storage battery module rental program causing a computer to execute:

acquiring module information from a storage battery module prepared in each providing point that is dispersedly distributed and that can be rented to a user;

acquiring individual information of a plurality of the users, the user being a rentee candidate of the storage battery module;

determining an incentive given for renting the storage battery module based on the individual information and the module information in such a way that the incentive could differ for each user; and

notifying the user of the incentive determined by the determining unit for each of the users.