Changing times

+1 to GG.

EVs can be recharged overnight when electrical demand is low. Many utilities are already providing time of use EV tariffs for their EV owning customers.
Air conditioners OTOH peak operating period conicides with the grid peak load in the late afternoon and early evening, and there's nothing than can be done about that.

Furthermore the next EV generation, starting with the Ford F150, will enable bidirectional charging, so a portion of the EVs storage can be dispatched to provide grid support, as well as used to provide autonomous household operation during outages.

Distributed EVs and renewable energy systems will form the backbone of the future grid and make it more robust, rather than burden it. All the tech for this exists today and is being tested in numerous locations around the world.

Sorry but you are not incorrect. I have worked in the renewable industry for over 40 years and have been deeply involved in development of these technologies. Aggregated battery dispatch works identically to aggregated load shedding, which is widespread now. EVs will be part of the solution not part of the problem.

It ain't your daddy's electrical grid.   Read this for example as it is directly applicable to the ERCOT situation.


ERCOT Aggregated Energy Storage Demo

The problem is that we don't really have a national grid in this country. We have a set of independent system operators (ISOs). ERCOT is the system operator for most of TX. It it unique in that it isn't even interconnected with the rest of the country.

Essentially TX decided to go it alone. As such they are not subject to FERC regulations, which are intended to provide grid security and reliability. The results of that decision are now pretty obvious.

This is a pretty good explanation of how are grid is structured for anyone who wants to dig into it a bit.





US Grid Explained

   I had been recently shopping for a new walk behind mower and was surprised to find the number of electric mowers. More electric mowers on display than gasoline mowers but after researching and reading reviews electric mowers made no sense for our 1/2 acre lot. As with motor vehicles the range of operation is the problem and the lifespan of batteries and the cost to replace them. I ended up buying another gasoline mower that's what sense. And mentioning power grids capable of handling charging motor vehicles you will have electric mowers needing to be charged too! 

Originally posted by StreetSweeper I never worked in ERCOT though I am in Texas now. Curious where this excess energy will come from. It isn't windmills, those will never generate the power it took to create them. It's been made too expensive to build new coal fired plants. Nuclear, though safe and reliable has a bad reputation. Hydro is great but there isn't enough water in most of the country besides the uproar that would ensure building them. Solar has promise but it isn't there yet. It isn't just the generation either. The 12.5 distribution system couldn't handle the massive load draw. 34.5 can handle more but it's dangerous in distribution. The transformers at the subs will likely need upgrading as will the feeder transformers. Then there's the home. The vast majority of existing homes will need to be rewired for charging. Again, yes the existing system can handle the 1's and 2's but every home charging an EV? No, not presently; to make it work expect huge rate increases for a long time.

Wow I haven't seen so much misinformation in a single paragraph in a long time. Here are some facts, Google them up yourself if you want.

Energy payback period (the time it takes for the project to return the energy used to produce it) of wind generation: less than 1 year

Energy payback period of photovoltaic (solar) generation: less than 2 years.

And of course if the equipment was produced using renewable energy to being with then there is zero net carbon production.

So the answer to where the energy will come from is renewables. It is happening as we speak. Renewables (wind and solar) accounted for 81% if the 28 GW of new installed electrical capacity in the US in 2021. Renewables are over 25% of total capacity now. An additional 30 GW of renewables is expected this year of which more than half will be solar. These prohects are private investments, no one would be installing them if they wasn't "there yet", whatever that means.

Far from considering new coal projects coal plants are being retired rapidly, they are not economically viable relative to renewables or natural gas.

I agree with you re nuke plants, it is possible for them to be operated safely, the French and the US Navy have demonstrated that with the right management structure and training it can be done. It is human error that has caused the infamous accidents that have led to the demise of that industry (except for Chernobyl which was caused by both human error and a terrible plant design).

Whether this could be done properly in our deregulated and highly fragmented electrical generation system is highly debatable. You do know that the TMI operators were indicted for falsifying safety test results? I wouldn't want to rely on ERCOT to manage more of them for example.

But the bottom line is that no one wants a nuke in their back yard. They are extremely expensive plants as well, far more expensive than renewables (about 5 to 10x higher just in installed cost, not counting operation and fuel costs) so investors won't touch them. There have been zero new nuke plants started in this country since Three Mile Island.

So coal is dying and nuclear is dead, the good hydro sites are already in use, or are simply not available in many parts of the country. New generation will be renewables and natural gas for the forseeable future.

Even if all US cars changed to EVs overnight the grid can easily handle charging them. You are assuming that all EVs will be charged at the same time and that will coincide with the afternoon and evening load peak. That is simply not the case, EVs can charge overnight when demand is low. Many if not most utilities have tariffs set up for for that already. And of course it will be many years before the transition to elecric is completed. The transmission and distribution infrastructure can handle it fine.


EV transition

Charging EVs at home is done via a level 2 charger which requires a 50A 240V circuit. Not a big deal to install unless you only have a 100A service.

The "holy grail" is using EVs as distributed energy storage. This will allow much deeper penetration of renewables because the storage mitigates the intermittency of the renewable resources. The typical EV battery has enough capacity to run a residence for several days and far more than enough to shift solar output a few hours so it can councide with the late sfternoon load peak. This requires a bidirectional charger/inverter. Ford will be the first in this country to offer this equipment along with the F150 Lightning. Nissan has been doing this in Japan for many years, but not here.