Supposedly, we are rapidly on our way toward a zero-carbon, all electric energy future. But has anybody done the arithmetic to see if this adds up?
I’m carving myself out a niche as the guy who does a few simple calculations to check if the grand schemes of our central planners make any sense. So far I’ve taken that approach to the question of energy storage to back up a wind/solar electricity grid, and on that one the schemes of the central planners most definitely do not add up. But the energy storage question, although involving no math beyond basic arithmetic, does have some complexities. How about something somewhat simpler, like: If we convert our entire automobile fleet to all-electric cars, where is the electricity going to come from?
With the big push currently on to get rid of internal combustion vehicles and replace them with electrics, surely someone has done the calculations to be sure that the electricity supply will be ample. Actually, that does not appear to be the case. Once again, the central planners have no idea what they are doing.
A few things in the recent news make this issue highly topical. First, in the days just before Christmas, much of the country experienced a severe cold snap. Severe, that is, but not record-breaking. Almost everywhere that had very cold temperatures during those days had had even colder temperatures in the past, not necessarily every year, but multiple times over the course of decades. Second, several utilities found themselves with insufficient electricity to meet demand, and had to impose rolling blackouts on their customers, even in the face of freezing cold temperatures. Examples of utilities imposing rolling blackouts during the severe cold wave included Duke Energy (covering most of North and South Carolina, and parts of Florida, Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky) and TVA (covering all of Tennessee and parts of Alabama, Mississippi and Kentucky). Both of those utilities, and many others, have spent the last decade and more shuttering reliable coal power plants, and building lots of wind turbines and solar panels, along with some (but obviously not enough) natural gas plants, as replacements.
As of today, electric vehicles are a tiny fraction of all vehicles (less than 1% in the U.S., says Reuters as of February 2022), particularly in these Midwestern and Southern states. Yet even with only the tiniest level of electricity demand coming from electric vehicles, already major utilities are short of electricity when a not-out-of-the-ordinary cold snap hits.
And now, where are things headed in the near future? The Wall Street Journal had a big piece with a January 1 date (it appeared in the print edition on January 3) about the coming rush of electric vehicles, headline “Shift to EVs Triggers Biggest Auto-Factory Building Boom in Decades.” The gist is that the industry is gearing up to build factories at a breakneck pace for the imminent supply of electric cars for all. Excerpt:
The U.S. auto industry is entering one of its biggest factory-building booms in years, a surge of spending largely driven by the shift to electric vehicles and new federal subsidies aimed at boosting U.S. battery manufacturing. Through November, about $33 billion in new auto-factory investment has been pledged in the U.S., including money for the construction of new assembly plants and battery-making facilities, according to the Center for Automotive Research, a nonprofit organization based in Michigan. . . . The capital outlays amount to a collective bet by the car industry that buyers will embrace battery-powered models in numbers large enough to support these investments. The global auto industry plans to spend a collective $526 billion on electric vehicles through 2026, according to consulting firm AlixPartners.
Whew! It’s the total transformation of the industry, from internal combustion engines to battery-electric. And if you look at the websites of the manufacturers themselves, they are almost all saying that they are committed to the rapid conversion to electric vehicles, with all internal-combustion manufacturing banished by some early date. Here is GM on its “path to an all-electric future” (by 2035); and here is Ford’s claim that it will “lead America’s shift to electric vehicles” (50% by 2030!). Numerous other manufacturers are making comparable claims.
OK, then, how much electricity is this going to take? I’ll start with this handy (if somewhat complicated) chart from the U.S. Energy Information Administration showing production (by source) and use (by sector) of all energy in the U.S. for the year 2021 (I do not find a chart for 2022 available as of yet.):
Here are a few key number from this chart:
- The total amount of energy consumed in the U.S. in 2021 is given as 73.5 quadrillion Btus.
- Of the 73.5 quadrillion Btus consumed, only 12.9 quadrillion Btus was in the form of electricity. That’s only 17.6% of total energy consumption.
- Almost all of the electricity was consumed in the household, commercial and industrial sectors, and almost none (less than 1%) in the transportation sector.
- The transportation sector consumed 26.9 quadrillion Btus of energy. That’s 37% of total energy consumption — and more than double the entire amount of electricity consumed in all sectors.
OK, but the transportation sector is a lot more than just automobiles. It also includes everything from airplanes to freight trains to ocean shipping. What part of that 26.9 quadrillion Btus of energy in the transportation sector consisted of automobiles and light trucks (like SUVs and pick-ups) which are the things that are supposedly about to get electrified? Looking around, I find something called the Transportation Energy Data Book, put out by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory — another part (like the EIA) of the U.S. Department of Energy. Here are two key facts from the introductory “Quick Facts” section: (1) “Petroleum comprised 90% of U.S. transportation energy use in 2020,” and (2) “Cars and light trucks accounted for 62% of U.S. transportation petroleum use in 2018.”
Assuming that those percentages held approximately true for 2021, then cars and light trucks consumed approximately some 26.9 x 0.9 x 0.62 = 15.0 quadrillion Btus in the form of gasoline or diesel in 2021 — well more than the entire amount of energy consumed in the country in that year in the form of electricity.
So have we now shown that converting all cars and light trucks to electric would require more than doubling the size of our electricity generation system? Unfortunately, it’s not quite that simple. There are a few other factors that need to be taken into account. Unfortunately, these additional factors are not subject to a great deal of precision, and can only be fairly rough approximations:
- Electric vehicles have about 85-90% efficiency in translating the stored energy in the battery into movement of the vehicle. That compares to only about 15-25% efficiency of ICE vehicles. That is a large difference.
- However, two other factors offset that advantage. One is that the batteries of electric vehicles experience an approximate 15% loss of charge in the turnaround between charge and discharge. The other is that the process of producing electricity in a power plant is in the range of 35-50% efficient, depending on the type of power plant. Some of the latest power plants even claim upwards of 50% efficiency, but note that the EIA chart above shows that the overall efficiency of electricity production in the U.S. is 35% (which also includes losses in transmission).
Put these factors together, and here is the calculation:
For an internal combustion vehicle, if you start with 10 Btus of energy in gasoline, you get about 2 Btus of motion from your car.
For an electric vehicle, if you start with the same 10 Btus of fuel, you get 10 x 0.35 = 3.5 Btus of usable electricity, 3.5 x 0.85 = 3.0 Btus of electricity in your battery after charging losses, and 3.0 x 0.87 = 2.6 Btus of motion from your car.
So overall, and remembering that this is approximate, an all-electric car and light truck fleet can run on about three-quarters (2 divided by 2.6) the number of Btus of energy input as can a comparable internal combustion-powered fleet. Instead of the 15 quadrillion Btus annually that we use for our current ICE vehicles, we could theoretically get it down to 11.25 quadrillion Btus, which would produce 11.25 x .35 = 3.93 quadrillion Btus of electricity to run the vehicles.
Recall that the current amount of electricity produced annually in the U.S., from the chart above, is 12.9 quadrillion Btus. So the additional 3.93 quadrillion Btus of electricity would represent approximately a 30.5% addition to the current capacity of our electricity generation system.
Are there any plans afoot for anything like that? Here’s another chart from EIA showing their projections of growth in U.S. electricity generation capacity out to 2050, from their 2022 Annual Energy Outlook:
Basically, after the current rebound from the 2020-21 Covid-induced decline, they project 1% annual increase in consumption as far as the eye can see. The “high economic growth” and “low economic growth” scenarios do not differ meaningfully from the median “reference” case. This growth includes growing demand for everything, including from growing population and every sort of new electric gizmo that might be invented over the period. And note that this projection, at least for the earlier years, is largely based on the plans of utilities to add capacity — or not. And to the extent anyone is adding capacity, it is likely to be wind and solar, which will be completely useless for charging these vehicles on calm nights and lots of other times.
So where is the surge in generation capacity to support a 30% or so additional need for electricity to electrify all cars? It sure doesn’t look to me like it is there.
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So where is the surge in generation capacity to support a 30% or so additional need for electricity to electrify all cars? It sure doesn’t look to me like it is there.
Don’t you just love Marxist central planning?
Perhaps you have the figures backwards. Look not at how much more electricity would be required but instead at how many fewer vehicles would be required for the available resources to be functional.
That points to the real plan – better start getting familiar with the bus schedule and buy a few pairs of comfy orthopedic shoes.
It would take about 200 fast charge points to service the same number of EVs as the 50 gas/diesel pumps in my town. The average EV recharge is enough for about 200 miles while the average ICE refueling is enough for about 400 miles. That means EVs would have to visit charge points twice as often to get equivalent range. I estimate that it would require more than doubling the electrical grid capacity for the town because there would have to be enough available to supply 200 fast chargers at 72 kW – that’s 14.4 MW. Town average use now is ~12 MW. By the way, natural gas is by far the dominate source for building and water heating in my area.
A lot of things don’t add up–it’s the new craze (i.e., funding pitch).
Simple graph shows why solar geoengineering needs to be studied (cnbc.com)
Fusion is right around the corner!
Just wait for it while you won nothing and be happy…
Francis, You forgot to include the losses involved with transmitting power from the power plant to the EV battery. Depending on who you talk to, that can range from 15 to 25 percent.
And that’s just cars. What about home heating as well? Has to be transformed to electicity as well. How much more demand will that bring?
This keeps coming up here at WUWT and I keep reminding everyone that the electricity demand from electric vehicles is not a continuous demand but rather is a time dependent demand that depends upon the daily clock.
Most EVs only receive a full charge at “home base”, wherever the vehicle is garaged, and this charging mostly occurs overnight when overall grid power demand is at its lowest in the 24 hour cycle. This is the time period that utilities encourage people to consume more energy, and reduce their energy demand during daylight hours when demand is always far higher than at night. The reason for this, of course, is that our grid and everything in it is sized based upon peak demand, not minimum demand.
The difference between peak daytime demand and night time minimum demand is more than 2:1, easily making up for any additional demand by EVs. Indeed, putting EVs on the grid with overnight charging actually makes the grid much more stable and reliable. The flatter the demand curve, the better.
Granted there is some vehicle charging during daylight hours, but the vast majority is done overnight, because full charges typically take place when the vehicle returns to the garage and is parked overnight. Also, the commercial chargers typically cost far more per KW-hr than what the power costs at home, as much as double or more difference. Utilities can encourage this variance in demand even more with residential rates that vary with time of day, which is what they’ve been doing for decades with commercial and industrial customers, and it’s easy peasy to also do it with residential customers with modern electronically reporting electric meters used most everywhere.
Also, EVs are not going to suddenly and instantaneously replace all ICVs. They will be phased in gradually over the next 20-40 years, and likely will never totally replace all ICVs.
The problem is that if you eliminate low demand hours through EV charging, they are no longer low demand hours, and the electricity prices will depend simply on whether there is a wind surplus or deficit. Indeed, as wind penetration increases that will come to dominate pricing at all times of day. So it becomes a case of charge your car when it’s windy. Perhaps acceptable for the low mileage user, but the regular user will find themselves regularly paying premium prices.
My guess is that 30-40% of workers are not home at night; they work nights…..some driving. The only time they can charge EV’s is in the daytime. Sorry to rain on your parade.
It doesn’t matter how many times you bring up utter irrelevancies, the remain irrelevant.
The current decrease in electric demand is because of the world as it is today.
First off generation: There is a surplus of power at night because fossil fuel and nuclear power plants work best if run at a constant rate. In the future the alarmists want for us involves wind and solar. Solar doesn’t work at night and wind usually dies down at night as well. There goes your surplus that you are counting on.
Secondly with heating converting from gas to electricity, the demand at night is going to go up especially during the winter.
At last, a sensible post. Adaption is the key. If anyone is struggling to pay their electricity bills, then try to use more electricity during off-peak periods when prices are significantly lower.
yep.. cook your evening meal and watch your favorite TV shows during the midday solar peak when rates are at their lowest..err. not quite practicable…
Not quite so….Here in Oz, as more solar enters the grid, we are finding a glut of power during the day, and, of course, a real need for dispatchable power in the early evenings when the sun has departed for the day. Already, energy distributors are moving incentives from overnight (off peak hot water etc) to middle of the day. We are also seeing curtailment of renewables occurring more frequently during the day. Renewables contribute around 12% average to the grid at this time, but the loony leftist labor government wants to increase that to 80% by 2030 as , after all, according to their leader, Albo, solar is the cheapest form of generating power..One wonders that if there is curtailment at 12% contribution, then how much over install and how much curtailment will be required at 80% contribution.. But you can bet London to a Brick, Albo will continue to rant that solar is still the cheapest generator on the planet…
Nighttime charging would be encouraged, certainly. You mean nighttime, after 9 or 10 p.m., though. But if someone comes home with a near-flat EV, they are going to want to get charging as soon as they come home, just as demand is peaking, in case they have to go out at night for an emergency or on-call work. Lots of people have to get their groceries after dinner because the kids have to be picked up at daycare and fed first. It will take more than a few dollars of penalty to deter people from doing immediate charging — there will need to be a law….
Ontario, Canada does not see a 2:1 difference between night and day demand. This week, trough demand is 14 GW and peak is about 18 GW. On top of that peak for domestic demand we export another 2-3 GW to Quebec and New York (mostly.) In winter (now) Quebec needs about 1 GW from us on top of their large hydroelectric dams way up north to power their electric resistance space heaters. (It’s too cold for heat pumps.) Ontario uses no electric heat — in cities it’s all gas, propane in rural areas not on the pipeline. So our domestic peak:trough ratio is only 1.3:1, not 2:1 as you imagine. If we were to go to electric heat (or heat pumps in the extreme south), nighttime demand would be much higher….probably ruinously so.
https://www.ieso.ca/power-data
OK, that’s winter. In summer, both daytime and nighttime demand are higher because of air conditioning which runs all night during hot spells. Houses don’t cool off at night all that much by themselves because of insulation. What wind we have drops off about 9 p.m. Windy nights are unusual except in storms. Nighttime demand is of course lower than daytime to reflect the work day but still not the 2:1 ratio that you say will allow easy-peasy charging of EVs. And of course it depends on how many of them there are. Supposedly the sale of ICE cars will be banned in Canada after 2035.
My comment disappeared, perhaps because the link to Ontario’s electricity generation operator, IESO was flagged as Spam.
Whatever, the ratio of peak:trough demand here is not 2:1, more like 1.3:1 right now in winter. (We don’t use electric heat.) All demand is higher in summer from air conditioning of homes and factories but from memory the ratio is not much different. A/C has to stay on all night in hot spells because insulated houses don’t cool down much at night. The wind, such as it is here, drops about 9 p.m.
Most people arriving home with a flat EV will want to start charging immediately in case they have to go out in the evening for emergencies or on-call work, not wait till 9 or 10 p.m. Even grocery shopping gets done after dinner if you have to pick up the kids at daycare and get them fed before you do anything else. If this adds too much to peak demand you will have to cut people off. Merely charging them an extra $5 or so won’t do it.
With the risk of fire, charging will mostly be done in driveways, not in garages. Leaving your car in the driveway all night is not what many people do, with the risk of theft. Charge as soon as you get home, then lock it in the garage when you go to bed. Obviously this is a strategy for us well-off people with suburban garages. I realize that the masses are never going to own EVs anyway, it’s pretty obvious.
I don’t think this will be as easy peasy as you glibly imply.
“Most people arriving home with a flat EV will want to start charging immediately in case they have to go out in the evening for emergencies or on-call work, not wait till 9 or 10 p.m. Even grocery shopping gets done after dinner if you have to pick up the kids at daycare and get them fed before you do anything else. If this adds too much to peak demand you will have to cut people off. Merely charging them an extra $5 or so won’t do it.”
That’s an unlikely scenario. Reading EV forums, it is clear that users rarely run their batteries down to anywhere near flat. The routine seems to be to plug the car in at night to keep the battery between 20 and 80%, via programmed charging. That also gives the user the option to pre-condition the car every morning so it is warm and ready to go.
It’s a similar habit to using mobile phones. We just plug them in automatically rather than waiting for the battery to hit empty.
Well, OK, but whether you put half a charge in every night (yes, more likely) or a whole charge in every other night (less likely) doesn’t change the over-all demand. Most people will still want to get that charge in ASAP, in case the power goes off and before the thieves come “car checking”. Waiting till after 9 saves money and works fine, until it doesn’t. For people who have to drive a lot, they may find they slip down below 20% just because things didn’t quite work as planned–had to use the heater, the lights, and the wipers after working past sunset on a cold rainy winter night, and will for sure want to charge as soon as they get home.
I realize these are edge cases but life is full of edges.
You beat me to it: I was going to make much the same points!
Wrt off-peak charging etc….”smart” chargers are already on the market and the cars themselves can – mostly – fulfill the same function. So users can programme charging for when power is cheap. That is usually a fixed off-peak period but some providers have an option to feed the vehicle anytime prices are low, such as a surges in windpower.
It can also be argued that making more use of off-peak power should, in a free market world (hah!), lead to lower power prices through greater utilisation of the assets so CapEx and OpEx are spread over higher output figures.
Lots of “Green Dreams” about tomorrow.
When will “tomorrow” ever become today?
All the “Green Dreams” have accomplished is to make today a nightmare.
This estimate does not even include the trucks !
The Tesla Semi is claimed to use 2kWh per mile (Tesla’s own figure).
I’ve found that in 2015, in the USA, there were a total of 280 trillion vehicle-miles for “truck, single unit” and for “truck, combination” (the two added together). Some might take issue with this, but it at least is a starting point.
https://www.bts.gov/content/us-vehicle-miles-millions
At 2,000 watt-hours per mile, I calculate this comes to some 560 TW-hours per year.
The average electricity generation rate, assuming 100% transmission and charging efficiencies, then needs to be 64 TW.
That is, 64,000GW, generating 24/7, just to run the truck fleet.
This is such a startlingly high figure that I suspect I have made a mistake somewhere !
Can anyone check this?
Having posted the above, I can now say I DID make a mistake, a small matter of three orders of magnitude !
The annual total for trucks should be 560 GW-hours per year.
The average electricity generation rate then needs to be 64GW (not 64,000GW) to run the truck fleet.
That’s still a respectable amount. It is about double the UK average electricity demand.
So where is the surge in generation capacity to support a 30% or so additional need for electricity to electrify all cars?
Countries like India are working diligently on the problem-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/other/india-expects-utilities-annual-coal-demand-to-surge-about-8-after-renewables-shortfall/ar-AA16aq5Y
But what would this skeptic know?
https://www.drive.com.au/news/toyota-boss-says-other-industry-executives-secretly-doubt-the-switch-to-electric-power/
https://topcarnews.net/are-you-waiting-for-a-new-toyota-the-massive-global-backlog-thats-keeping-you-waiting-revealed-s138904.html
Smacks forehead! We forgot about virtuous power plants and all those EV owners buying larger range batteries than they need for transportation in order to connect up with V2G and let their neighbours wear them out to keep the lights on-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/topstories/gm-ford-google-partner-to-promote-virtual-power-plants/ar-AA16blKd
PS: Don’t forget the TEN THOUSAND smackeroonies worth of virtuousity too-
https://www.carsales.com.au/editorial/details/world-first-bi-directional-ev-chargers-almost-here-134220/
Go long on mining and metals. This madness will be around for a while, irrespective of the fundamentals.
This is opinion. I am not a qualified investment analyst.
But an astute observer of Einstein’s theory that –
“There are only 2 things that are infinite – the cosmos and man’s stupidity”.
You’re probably working on the assumption that the population of the planet will be roughly the same (or continuing on it’s predicted growth path). I don’t think that the people with designs on taking over the world hold the same view. Their future world is one with far fewer people in it. Perhaps 5-6 billion fewer people. They suppose that once that condition is met, we (they) will be able to live in some utopian paradise. Never mind how they get there though, or that the utopia that they envision is a mirage.
You won’t need to worry about millions of people with electric cars. The common folk will not be permitted cars, they must stay within 10km of their assigned habitat cubical, until the government decides that they are eligible for voluntary euthanasia. They will own nothing, eat bugs, and they will be happy. You will need to be happy, because being unhappy (especially with the government) will effect your social credit score, and you won’t be able to access your allotment of bugs to eat.
The only good news is that bugs turn out to be no more emissions-efficient than chickens in converting feed into high-quality protein. If you feed the bugs junk, like styrofoam or rice husks, they don’t do any better with it than you would. Of course that means you won’t be allowed to have bugs to eat, either…..
The EV fan club’s international darling has impure thoughts no doubt corrupted by the evil Toyota San-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/other/norway-awards-47-oil-and-gas-exploration-permits/ar-AA16aEip
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/7676615486898450570/8783427795720659160?hl=en
If you’ve quite finished with the WLTP testing we’ll turn the range extender on now-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/motoring/news/ram-1500-ev-to-get-range-extender-option-stellantis-ceo-confirms/ar-AA16aLBQ
In another illustration of the hopelessness of the quest for battery powered vehicles, miners have proposed opening a lithium mine in the middle of the Great Basin in Northern Nevada. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thacker_Pass_Lithium_Mine
The usual suspects are suing to block the opening of the mine because, wouldn’t you know it the site is sacred to Native Americans; just as sacred as Mecca is to Muslims, the Western Wall is to Jews, and the Holy Sepulcure is to Christians. https://www.npr.org/2023/01/06/1147547868/tribes-are-suing-to-stop-a-proposed-lithium-mine-in-nevada-saying-the-site-is-sa
The warmunists vs the anti-racists. Pass the popcorn.
We won’t be able to have nice things until the last lawyer is strangled with the entrails of the last environmentalist.
I suppose the site became sacred only after the miners announced plans to dig there….
We actually had a case in Canada where a developer offered to amend a proposed ski resort in the Kootenays of British Columbia in response to Native objections that it would encroach on grizzly bear habitat. That wasn’t good enough for the Natives but the judge said it was, that it met all permitting rules and could go ahead. Mightily miffed at getting stiffed, the Natives came back to Court with the story that an elder on her death bed had a dream that said the whole mountain was sacred to the grizzly bear Spirit and it would be offended if any development occurred anywhere. The old lady was now conveniently dead and couldn’t be cross examined. The Court said, No, we live in a secular country, not a theocracy, and claims that large areas of land are sacred are just not tenable. It went to the Supreme Court and the developer won.
You should have heard the caterwauling from the Left.
In Canada, Natives have to be consulted during the permitting process about development that affects their traditional territory but they do not have a veto, no matter what objections they raise. They think they have a veto, though, and often behave as if they do, blocking access roads, vandalizing equipment, yadda yadda.
I hope the Nevada miners prevail. You can’t have vast tracts of wilderness under the sovereign control of a rival government citing religion.
Until otherwise proved by strong historical evidence, all claims of sacred land should be regarded as attempted armed robbery.
The happiness just keeps on coming-
https://www.solarquotes.com.au/blog/qld-dumb-solar-shutdown/
I find it odd that near every committed Capitalist uses the word ‘socialism’ as universal talismanic insult at anyone not embracing said capitalist’s vision of the Free Market, yet every single one accepts government subsidies (socialism) as a necessary part of his capitalist utopia. Every single ‘challenge’ in our society can be solved with a bit of miscegnation and lots of guvmint supsiddies?
What I find odder, is that not one single voice arises to challenge the utterly stupid idea of recharging batteries. Has not one engineer thought of making those batteries instantly replaceable? Go the a station, they fork out the battery, replaced it with a fully charged unit, and bill you for the energy used from the previous battery.
This solves a number of problems: Range. Homes burning down because we let people who care nothing assemble dangerous packets of highly volatile poisons. Battery suppliers improving their product, instead of a one-time buyer being given a lemon to suck on. Centralised control over the dangerous waste material from old batteries. Centralised, non-urban charging facilities not interfering with the rest of the economy they are ‘saving’. On and on.
Not even the Great Musk himself is willing to take this obvious step,seeing as he is the biggest subsidy miner in the world. A True Capitalist. Remember the early days, when he \told us how we will plug the car into the house, TO RUN THE HOUSE?
The irony, it burns!
The head of the National Transportation Safety Board expressed concern Wednesday about the safety risks that heavy electric vehicles pose if they collide with lighter vehicles. The official, Jennifer Homendy, raised the issue in a speech in Washington to the Transportation Research Board. She noted, by way of example, that an electric GMC Hummer weighs about 9,000 pounds (4,000 kilograms), with a battery pack that alone is 2,900 pounds (1,300 kilograms) — roughly the entire weight of a typical Honda Civic
I had the same questions and did similar research and ended up on the same Department of Energy website. One note on that page caught my eye… see the note on electric power that says “Electrical System Energy Losses – 65%”… The same website for the The US Energy Administration website goes on to say that 65% of electric energy produced is “Lost”. Apparently uncooperative little electrons jump off the powerline in large numbers if pushed to travel too far. So we actually need to produce much more electrical power to replace the the same amount of fossil fuels we intend to replace. There is definately a cost to transportign petroleum fuels – but it is not 65% and a gas can or Strategic Petroleum Reserve will be tehre and useful when needed.
What they are referring to is that the heat energy from a traditional fossil-fuel-boiler/steam-turbine-generator electrical plant has a 40% efficiency at best. That’s in terms of btu input from burning the fuel and the electrical watts output from the generator. At least 60% of the heat is lost, i.e. through the stack, radiated, used to run auxiliaries, etc.. But the biggest loss is the turbine-generator that can use only about 60% of its heat energy just because of the laws of thermodynamics. So almost 40% of the heat in the steam has been unused when it exits the system.
Great report. And it’s even worse than the potential Electricity shortages.
In many regions of the U.S. it’s likely that the new non plug-in hybrids cause less CO2 than the fuel used to charge an EV that are charged from the grid.
The EV enthusiasts want to believe that they can look at the mix of fuels in their region and average them to determine the impact of charging EV’s. That’s not logical. You have to look at the change of fuel use when a significant new load is added.
In the short term (hours) a variation in demand can be matched with a rapid changing natural gas (NG) unit. But in the longer term a new balance has to be reached. The eia arm of the Department of Energy recently published their latest forecast based on the most optimistic plans for adding renewables (AEO2022). They see no increase in Electricity demand in coming decades and NG production leveling out at the optimum capacity factor 0f 86%. Nuclear and hydro will remain base loaded.
Since 2005 we’ve been able to reduce coal steadily, mainly due to fracking but also due to an increasing contribution from renewables. Their vision through 2050 is that NG holds constant and is used for hourly and/or seasonable variations and renewables will grow enough such that coal can continue to be reduced. i.e. We add 1000 Megawatthours of renewables and we can reduce coal by 1000 Megawatthours.
But,meanwhile, if we add a load of 500 Megawatthours for EV charging, we don’t save all that coal; only half of it. So we have to assign that difference in coal firing to the EV’s. Until we totally eliminate coal that’s the situation in much of the U.S.. (Even in California where they have never fired coal in Electric Utility plants they buy 30% from outside the state, including from the southwest that includes coal.)
I’ve done the math (available upon request along with references).
Excluding line losses, charging one EV doing 12,500 miles per year results in 4.08 metric tons of CO2 annually.
I assume 52 mpg for a non plug-in hybrid. I know many existing models get much less, but even the Climate Change activists concede that the Prius Eco gets 55 mpg.
That works out to 2.22 metric tons per year.
So you would think that someone truly worried about climate change would strongly favor Hybrids over EV’s until we can clean up the electrical grid. Not so. EV has become a religion.