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> if adaptations aren’t made before net-zero goals for EVs are met. Of course. Why would we not make adaptations? The job of the grid is to adapt to consumer n

> if adaptations aren’t made before net-zero goals for EVs are met. Of course. Why would we not make adaptations? The job of the grid is to adapt to consumer needs. They aren’t perfect, but it makes sense that they’ll adapt. I wouldn’t count on consumers changing unless the grid does something simple like set prices to incentivize charging patterns. I have a few electric companies near me. One just has flat rates. The other has nighttime rates that are much lower. I expect all power companies will end up like this. Or just grant low prices for “smart chargers” that auto charge based on when there’s excess capacity. These types of articles seem funny to me as a form of “I haven’t eaten in the past 8 hours, if this trend continues I will starve to death in two days.”

toomuchtodo 4y ago
Indeed. I have talked to multiple utility representatives from Florida all the way up to Illinois, and they are all aware of the upgrades that are going to be necessary to support full electrification. Not just vehicles, but everything (cooking, hvac, etc). ComEd in Illinois even mentions it on billboard advertising they have in their market (“Electrification is coming. We’ll be ready.”). https://www.icc.illinois.gov/docket/P2022-0432/documents/325766/files/567114.pdf https://www.icc.illinois.gov/docket/P2022-0432/documents/325... https://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-comed-seeks-multiyear-rate-increase-electrification-20230117-2uhp7swyrng73oxy32cj4asini-story.html https://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-comed-seeks-m...
AdrianB1 4y ago
If you consider what is the cost of "adapting" I bet your discourse would change. EVs have massive consumption, way bigger than lights, computers and AC/heating combined. In my part of the world (Eastern Europe) the usual power consumed by a home is 0.5 to 2kW, with short time spikes to 3-4kW. An EV can easily go 12KW, that requires a very expensive upgrade in capacity and load balancing of the grid to accept locally (in a city block) hundreds of cars randomly connecting with huge surges. You need some kind of interface and protocol to coordinate car charging per micro-grid.
- matthewdgreen 4y ago
  EVs can go to 12kw but don’t need to. At that rate a Tesla will add over 40 range-miles per hour, which means you’d recharge the entire battery range in about eight hours. Some people do drive 300 miles per day, but on average people drive less than 30 miles (in the US) and maybe 40km/day in Europe. When you work this out into a continuous power draw over the course of a day, it’s a few hundred watts per vehicle. Still requires grid upgrades and some planning to avoid spikes where everyone fast-charges at once, but it’s better to consider these smaller averages than assume everyone is doing 12kw charging continuously.
- dzhiurgis 4y ago
  Eastern European home is a flat with 5x smaller footprint. I charge at ~2.7KW and drive 3000 km per month. Could probably get away with 500W charge rate, but would need to plug all the time.
hencq 4y ago
Exactly. It's always weird when current infrastructure gets brought up as an objection against new technology (EVs, clean energy transition etc.). As if it's some unchangeable law of nature. It makes me wonder if, during the industrial revolution, people pointed out that trains could never take off because there were no railroads for them.
- prepend 4y ago
  I think people have a hard time visualizing change. It’s similar to the “what’s the point of oil exploration on today’s prices since it takes 10 years to yield.”
- peteradio 4y ago
  Yea but nobody was like "we are gonna kill all these horses in 7 years".
  - neon_electro 4y ago
    Used vehicle sales will continue in 7 years.
mfer 4y ago
I think it’s more complicated than it seems. For example, - electricity payments are highly regulated. I’ve seen places where the electric company wants to raise rates to cover investments in infra only to see the gov not allow it. - there are laws that impact how they can upgrade the infrastructure and limit the abilities of the electric companies These are legislative issues that need to be dealt with by non-experts. Articles like this can help with those processes
tsimionescu 4y ago
> The other has nighttime rates that are much lower. Shouldn't it be the other way around? As I understand, the goal is to get vehicle owners to charge during the day, since (domestic) consumption at night is already high, and since solar only helps then.
- ivalm 4y ago
  Peak utilisation is ~9 pm, best to charge is probably 10 am to 4 pm. https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx
- oakesm9 4y ago
  Currently in the UK energy prices are lowest at night when usage is lowest. Night being after most people are in bed and before they wake up. You're correct that when solar makes up a larger propotion of the energy created, it might change that, but that doesn't change the idea of encouaging people to charge when energy is most abundant/cheapest. There are already companies doing this in the UK such as Octopus with their Agile tarrif[0]. the unit price you pay changes every 30 minutes based on the wholesale price at the time. It's capped at 100p/kwh, which is 3x the average flat rate people use in the UK, but on the flip side it can go below 0p and at those points you actually get paid for using electicity. In those cases you're acting as a load balancer when there's just too much energy in the network. You can see a graph of the past prices here[1]. Octopus also has a pretty good API and hooks in IFTTT so you can set up automations for yourself. You could set your car or home bettery when the price is under a certain price. This could also just be built into the charge in the future and there's no reason why it couldn't be a standard between energy providers too. [0] https://octopus.energy/agile/ https://octopus.energy/agile/ [1] https://dashboards.energy-stats.uk/d/5cZqqmf4z/user-dashboard?orgId=1 https://dashboards.energy-stats.uk/d/5cZqqmf4z/user-dashboar...
- prepend 4y ago
  Usage is high during the way due to work and industry with a peak around 8pm. Electricity usage midnight-5am is very low. And rates are lowered even further as many power plants produce at a uniform rate, regardless of time of day. Things like hydro, nuclear, tidal, and wind.

toomuchtodo 4y ago

Indeed. I have talked to multiple utility representatives from Florida all the way up to Illinois, and they are all aware of the upgrades that are going to be necessary to support full electrification. Not just vehicles, but everything (cooking, hvac, etc). ComEd in Illinois even mentions it on billboard advertising they have in their market (“Electrification is coming. We’ll be ready.”). https://www.icc.illinois.gov/docket/P2022-0432/documents/325766/files/567114.pdf https://www.icc.illinois.gov/docket/P2022-0432/documents/325... https://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-comed-seeks-multiyear-rate-increase-electrification-20230117-2uhp7swyrng73oxy32cj4asini-story.html https://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-comed-seeks-m...

AdrianB1 4y ago

If you consider what is the cost of "adapting" I bet your discourse would change. EVs have massive consumption, way bigger than lights, computers and AC/heating combined. In my part of the world (Eastern Europe) the usual power consumed by a home is 0.5 to 2kW, with short time spikes to 3-4kW. An EV can easily go 12KW, that requires a very expensive upgrade in capacity and load balancing of the grid to accept locally (in a city block) hundreds of cars randomly connecting with huge surges. You need some kind of interface and protocol to coordinate car charging per micro-grid.

matthewdgreen 4y ago
EVs can go to 12kw but don’t need to. At that rate a Tesla will add over 40 range-miles per hour, which means you’d recharge the entire battery range in about eight hours. Some people do drive 300 miles per day, but on average people drive less than 30 miles (in the US) and maybe 40km/day in Europe. When you work this out into a continuous power draw over the course of a day, it’s a few hundred watts per vehicle. Still requires grid upgrades and some planning to avoid spikes where everyone fast-charges at once, but it’s better to consider these smaller averages than assume everyone is doing 12kw charging continuously.
dzhiurgis 4y ago
Eastern European home is a flat with 5x smaller footprint. I charge at ~2.7KW and drive 3000 km per month. Could probably get away with 500W charge rate, but would need to plug all the time.

hencq 4y ago

Exactly. It's always weird when current infrastructure gets brought up as an objection against new technology (EVs, clean energy transition etc.). As if it's some unchangeable law of nature. It makes me wonder if, during the industrial revolution, people pointed out that trains could never take off because there were no railroads for them.

prepend 4y ago
I think people have a hard time visualizing change. It’s similar to the “what’s the point of oil exploration on today’s prices since it takes 10 years to yield.”
peteradio 4y ago
Yea but nobody was like "we are gonna kill all these horses in 7 years".
- neon_electro 4y ago
  Used vehicle sales will continue in 7 years.

mfer 4y ago

I think it’s more complicated than it seems. For example, - electricity payments are highly regulated. I’ve seen places where the electric company wants to raise rates to cover investments in infra only to see the gov not allow it. - there are laws that impact how they can upgrade the infrastructure and limit the abilities of the electric companies These are legislative issues that need to be dealt with by non-experts. Articles like this can help with those processes

tsimionescu 4y ago

> The other has nighttime rates that are much lower. Shouldn't it be the other way around? As I understand, the goal is to get vehicle owners to charge during the day, since (domestic) consumption at night is already high, and since solar only helps then.

ivalm 4y ago
Peak utilisation is ~9 pm, best to charge is probably 10 am to 4 pm. https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx
oakesm9 4y ago
Currently in the UK energy prices are lowest at night when usage is lowest. Night being after most people are in bed and before they wake up. You're correct that when solar makes up a larger propotion of the energy created, it might change that, but that doesn't change the idea of encouaging people to charge when energy is most abundant/cheapest. There are already companies doing this in the UK such as Octopus with their Agile tarrif[0]. the unit price you pay changes every 30 minutes based on the wholesale price at the time. It's capped at 100p/kwh, which is 3x the average flat rate people use in the UK, but on the flip side it can go below 0p and at those points you actually get paid for using electicity. In those cases you're acting as a load balancer when there's just too much energy in the network. You can see a graph of the past prices here[1]. Octopus also has a pretty good API and hooks in IFTTT so you can set up automations for yourself. You could set your car or home bettery when the price is under a certain price. This could also just be built into the charge in the future and there's no reason why it couldn't be a standard between energy providers too. [0] https://octopus.energy/agile/ https://octopus.energy/agile/ [1] https://dashboards.energy-stats.uk/d/5cZqqmf4z/user-dashboard?orgId=1 https://dashboards.energy-stats.uk/d/5cZqqmf4z/user-dashboar...
prepend 4y ago
Usage is high during the way due to work and industry with a peak around 8pm. Electricity usage midnight-5am is very low. And rates are lowered even further as many power plants produce at a uniform rate, regardless of time of day. Things like hydro, nuclear, tidal, and wind.