6 ms·

How likely are cars with V2G to be the grid batteries of the future?

throwawaaarrgh 3y ago
From my view: Uncertain. It's currently more of a "we would like to explore X" rather than a "we will depend on X". It's actually simpler to just pay for and build the more industrial scale battery installations, even considering the difficulties of financing, real estate, construction, regulations, etc. But I just work for one big company, maybe someone else is taking it much more seriously. Personally I'm still not sure how the hell all the apartments and cities in the world are going to both install enough chargers and solve subscription charging when almost all the charger companies have absolute dogshit hardware on 3+ year old obsolete charging standards. Their software is so bad I can't believe someone was paid to write it. So, yeah, V2G? Let's get reliable managed chargers everywhere first and then think about the grid
keep_reading 3y ago
Extremely unlikely because it doesn't align with the financial incentives of the power companies to improve infra to support mass V2G when those batteries are not guaranteed to be available in the first place
- adregan 3y ago
  A recent episode[0] of the catalyst podcast makes a pretty convincing argument that in aggregate, car behavior is so predictable that V2X could be a valuable asset. 0: https://pca.st/episode/77c6a8a5-4967-4a71-9da0-f1ab7d56c703 https://pca.st/episode/77c6a8a5-4967-4a71-9da0-f1ab7d56c703
  - TheLoafOfBread 3y ago
    It won't. Simple argument why should people allow adding more cycles to their batteries in their expensive cars.
    - adregan 3y ago
      For money, of course.
  - ryathal 3y ago
    The problem is getting people to actually agree to plug in their car and let the power company run it. That's a huge ask to get people to agree to, it's going to take serious compensation that power companies won't want to do.
    - manmal 3y ago
      Why not? Where I live, consumers already get compensated ca €0,08 per kWh generated by their solar panels. At peak times, where spot prices are sometimes €0,3 or more, they could pay extra for people who want to provide power from batteries.
tomatocracy 3y ago
One issue with this is that at we have peaks in demand for electricity exactly when cars are more likely to be on the roads (morning and evening commute times, roughly). So for it to happen at large scale, we would need to see significant reductions in eg night time generation capacity. In my view this is unlikely (nuclear and wind will still run at night even if we close every coal, oil and gas fired generator).
- benj111 3y ago
  i dont doubt theres an overlap, but theres a peak in demand precisely because people are no longer in their cars. people dont turn the oven/heating/kettle on when theyre in the car.

From my view: Uncertain. It's currently more of a "we would like to explore X" rather than a "we will depend on X". It's actually simpler to just pay for and build the more industrial scale battery installations, even considering the difficulties of financing, real estate, construction, regulations, etc. But I just work for one big company, maybe someone else is taking it much more seriously. Personally I'm still not sure how the hell all the apartments and cities in the world are going to both install enough chargers and solve subscription charging when almost all the charger companies have absolute dogshit hardware on 3+ year old obsolete charging standards. Their software is so bad I can't believe someone was paid to write it. So, yeah, V2G? Let's get reliable managed chargers everywhere first and then think about the grid

keep_reading 3y ago

Extremely unlikely because it doesn't align with the financial incentives of the power companies to improve infra to support mass V2G when those batteries are not guaranteed to be available in the first place

adregan 3y ago
A recent episode[0] of the catalyst podcast makes a pretty convincing argument that in aggregate, car behavior is so predictable that V2X could be a valuable asset. 0: https://pca.st/episode/77c6a8a5-4967-4a71-9da0-f1ab7d56c703 https://pca.st/episode/77c6a8a5-4967-4a71-9da0-f1ab7d56c703
- TheLoafOfBread 3y ago
  It won't. Simple argument why should people allow adding more cycles to their batteries in their expensive cars.
  - adregan 3y ago
    For money, of course.
- ryathal 3y ago
  The problem is getting people to actually agree to plug in their car and let the power company run it. That's a huge ask to get people to agree to, it's going to take serious compensation that power companies won't want to do.
  - manmal 3y ago
    Why not? Where I live, consumers already get compensated ca €0,08 per kWh generated by their solar panels. At peak times, where spot prices are sometimes €0,3 or more, they could pay extra for people who want to provide power from batteries.

tomatocracy 3y ago

One issue with this is that at we have peaks in demand for electricity exactly when cars are more likely to be on the roads (morning and evening commute times, roughly). So for it to happen at large scale, we would need to see significant reductions in eg night time generation capacity. In my view this is unlikely (nuclear and wind will still run at night even if we close every coal, oil and gas fired generator).

benj111 3y ago
i dont doubt theres an overlap, but theres a peak in demand precisely because people are no longer in their cars. people dont turn the oven/heating/kettle on when theyre in the car.