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This article seems to be mostly fear-mongering? I am surprised to see it this far up on HN. Highway charging stations will need a lot of power to charge all th

This article seems to be mostly fear-mongering? I am surprised to see it this far up on HN. Highway charging stations will need a lot of power to charge all the cars and we’ll have to build the infrastructure to make it happen. Literally no surprise here.

nonethewiser 4y ago
It being true does not make it insignificant.
locallost 4y ago
It's not fear mongering, but call to action. > If state agencies and utilities don’t coordinate on how to supply high-voltage grid interconnections to the mega-charging hubs coming down the pike, the result could be delays and higher costs that hinder expansion of a technology that’s key to decarbonizing transportation. >“If we wait 10 years or 15 years to make these investments, I can guarantee you they’ll be double or triple” what they would be if they were planned well in advance, said Brian Wilkie, National Grid’s director of transportation electrification in New York.
KennyBlanken 4y ago
When it comes to green/progressive tech/infrastructure like wind/solar, electric cars, and so on: fear-mongering, conservatism, and misunderstanding is pretty much how HN rolls. HN commenters love to shout about wind and solar being stupid ("WhAT haPPens at nIGhT!? wINd DoESN't ALwaYs bLOW!!! GOTCHA!") yet grid-scale energy storage systems are quite common and one of the fastest areas of capex investment by utilities...and then there's the constant stream of "nuclear is the future!" nonsense. The power generation debate is over; utilities and grids aren't buying nuclear, they're buying wind, solar, and some natural gas backup capacity...and not because "liberal brainwashing" or some other nonsense, but because wind and solar are the cheapest source of power right now, and wind especially keeps dropping in price. Neither presents anywhere near the level of headaches of nuclear, and it takes months to build out and a few years to break even on carbon footprint, not decades. There's a fair bit of dunning-krueger effect as well; scroll down to see comments from "not an electrical engineer" who is talking about "buckets of electrons" and thinks that EV charging is something where there's so many "amps" we need to think of the chil...er, have safety protocols. Like DCFC stations and L1/L2 charge adapters don't already do a whole suite of electrical safety checks every time they start charging a vehicle....

nonethewiser 4y ago

It being true does not make it insignificant.

locallost 4y ago

It's not fear mongering, but call to action. > If state agencies and utilities don’t coordinate on how to supply high-voltage grid interconnections to the mega-charging hubs coming down the pike, the result could be delays and higher costs that hinder expansion of a technology that’s key to decarbonizing transportation. >“If we wait 10 years or 15 years to make these investments, I can guarantee you they’ll be double or triple” what they would be if they were planned well in advance, said Brian Wilkie, National Grid’s director of transportation electrification in New York.

KennyBlanken 4y ago

When it comes to green/progressive tech/infrastructure like wind/solar, electric cars, and so on: fear-mongering, conservatism, and misunderstanding is pretty much how HN rolls. HN commenters love to shout about wind and solar being stupid ("WhAT haPPens at nIGhT!? wINd DoESN't ALwaYs bLOW!!! GOTCHA!") yet grid-scale energy storage systems are quite common and one of the fastest areas of capex investment by utilities...and then there's the constant stream of "nuclear is the future!" nonsense. The power generation debate is over; utilities and grids aren't buying nuclear, they're buying wind, solar, and some natural gas backup capacity...and not because "liberal brainwashing" or some other nonsense, but because wind and solar are the cheapest source of power right now, and wind especially keeps dropping in price. Neither presents anywhere near the level of headaches of nuclear, and it takes months to build out and a few years to break even on carbon footprint, not decades. There's a fair bit of dunning-krueger effect as well; scroll down to see comments from "not an electrical engineer" who is talking about "buckets of electrons" and thinks that EV charging is something where there's so many "amps" we need to think of the chil...er, have safety protocols. Like DCFC stations and L1/L2 charge adapters don't already do a whole suite of electrical safety checks every time they start charging a vehicle....