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Talk to me about how that works when 80% of people are charging every day. That spare capacity goes away as everyone economically chases it to the point of satu

Talk to me about how that works when 80% of people are charging every day. That spare capacity goes away as everyone economically chases it to the point of saturation. Everyone can change their schedule and they will all go for the cheapest, which will normalize power prices across the board, AKA no cheap power windows.

bluGill 3y ago
Cars are only a small part of the total energy pie, and EVs are a lot more efficient: even with 100% charging the cheap power window won't go away. It won't be as cheap, but most uses of cars are flexible enough to charge during the low price window whenever that happens to be, and the window is large enough to keep the prices down.
- monkeynotes 3y ago
  > Cars are only a small part of the total energy pie If 80% of US drivers switched to electric vehicles, the total annual electricity consumption would be approximately 1,013,472,000,000 kWh (or about 1.01 trillion kWh). This calculation is based on the assumptions of an average annual mileage of 13,500 miles per vehicle, an average electric consumption of 0.34 kWh per mile, and a total of approximately 276 million vehicles in the US. As a contrast, today's total output of power in the US is 4 to 4.5 trillion kWh. So capacity needs to increase 1/4 which is not trivial. Caveat here is we keep the same efficiency in EVs.
  - Gibbon1 3y ago
    Course to go to 80% would require probably 15 years. 25% / 15 years is 1.7% a year. Does not seem like a big deal. A question. Is the extra electricity need to power electric cars less or greater than the amount required by more air conditioning due to global warming.
    - bluGill 3y ago
      which is why EVs are not a big deal. Any utility director/planner knows they are coming and factors them into their 10 year plans. They should also be building wind and solar at high rates just because they are so cheap as sources of power.
      - Gibbon1 3y ago
        I don't deal with power utilities. But have talked to water utility managers. Key thing. Regulated utilities can't just raise prices to generate a profit. But capital improvements are an asset that you can earn a profit on. So investment is how you can 'grow the business' Replace the pole pig feeding your house with bigger one? The utility makes a profit off that. If it were me I'd get the utility involved in upgrading residential panels to support heat pumps and car charging.
    - xcrunner529 3y ago
      They got quiet quick! The Facebook memes didn’t mention air conditioning.

bluGill 3y ago

Cars are only a small part of the total energy pie, and EVs are a lot more efficient: even with 100% charging the cheap power window won't go away. It won't be as cheap, but most uses of cars are flexible enough to charge during the low price window whenever that happens to be, and the window is large enough to keep the prices down.

monkeynotes 3y ago
> Cars are only a small part of the total energy pie If 80% of US drivers switched to electric vehicles, the total annual electricity consumption would be approximately 1,013,472,000,000 kWh (or about 1.01 trillion kWh). This calculation is based on the assumptions of an average annual mileage of 13,500 miles per vehicle, an average electric consumption of 0.34 kWh per mile, and a total of approximately 276 million vehicles in the US. As a contrast, today's total output of power in the US is 4 to 4.5 trillion kWh. So capacity needs to increase 1/4 which is not trivial. Caveat here is we keep the same efficiency in EVs.
- Gibbon1 3y ago
  Course to go to 80% would require probably 15 years. 25% / 15 years is 1.7% a year. Does not seem like a big deal. A question. Is the extra electricity need to power electric cars less or greater than the amount required by more air conditioning due to global warming.
  - bluGill 3y ago
    which is why EVs are not a big deal. Any utility director/planner knows they are coming and factors them into their 10 year plans. They should also be building wind and solar at high rates just because they are so cheap as sources of power.
    - Gibbon1 3y ago
      I don't deal with power utilities. But have talked to water utility managers. Key thing. Regulated utilities can't just raise prices to generate a profit. But capital improvements are an asset that you can earn a profit on. So investment is how you can 'grow the business' Replace the pole pig feeding your house with bigger one? The utility makes a profit off that. If it were me I'd get the utility involved in upgrading residential panels to support heat pumps and car charging.
  - xcrunner529 3y ago
    They got quiet quick! The Facebook memes didn’t mention air conditioning.