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Electric vehicles use roughly a third of the energy so that 30 PWh only needs to be an extra 10 PWh for the grid. We need to increase overall capcity by 50%.
by simonbarker87 8y ago
Electric vehicles use roughly a third of the energy so that 30 PWh only needs to be an extra 10 PWh for the grid. We need to increase overall capcity by 50%.
- Someone 8y agoChances are the network isn’t used at full capacity, so if people are willing to charge their cars outside peak hours (e.g, between midnight 7 AM, we wouldn’t need 50% more, network wise.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- ben_w 8y ago10 PWh / year (just over 1 TW average) is currently a half-trillion dollar installation cost, assuming $0.23/W PV with a 50% duty cycle. Yes, this is still an improvement; yes it should be done; it’s just not trivial.
- codeulike 8y agoAlso, most charging will happen at home, at night.
- ben_w 8y agoI doubt that; PV is cheap compared to storage, so it makes more sense to install twice as much PV as needed and include the charging plugs in existing car parks (and waste some power during commuting and lunch breaks), than to add enough immobile storage to allow most car charging to happen at night.
- codeulike 8y agoThe thing about nighttime is that thats when the car isn't moving around much. Best time to charge.
- ben_w 8y agoOnly when the power doesn’t come from PV. If it does, you need (three?) times as much battery capacity: the car’s battery, the immobile battery that the car charges from, and the battery which powers your houses (and some industry and commerce) overnight. If you charge your cars during the day, you can use some of the battery capacity in the electric cars, partially discharging some of them overnight to supply your nighttime needs.
- codeulike 8y agoYeah I see what you mean. Maybe everyone will need to commute nocturnally once we're running everything on solar!
- chefkoch 8y agoSo one year the defense budget. Seems possible