Like so many discussions about electric power, carbon footprint, energy costs, and generation sources, much of what is said rains down from clouds of those without any real understanding of any of these elements. The “studies” and information dumps about electric vehicles (EVs) is no exception to this truth.
First, lets back up a few steps and look at the electric
grid itself before we dive off into an analysis of EVs and their true costs and
values. The grid is a conglomeration of generation resources which convert some
kind of fuel (hydro, coal, natural gas, nuclear, fuel oil) into a resource
which can spin a generator to produce commercial electric power. These generators
are connected to each other, and to your local utility, by a variety of
transmission lines. Taken all together, they make up the grid.
The generators are turned on and off each day (well except
for the very large baseload plants) as demand rises and declines for
electricity. Therein lies one of the biggest problems with operating the grid. Certain
times of the day there is barely enough generation to satisfy the demand (peak
times) and other times of the day there is so little demand (mainly at night and
on weekends) that generators must be shut down, only to be restarted at very
great expense, a few hours later. The physics which govern the electric power
industry have been demanding a more efficient, flatter demand for electricity
for the last one hundred years. However, nearly all electric utilities price
electricity in a flat cost per kWh fashion, which suggests that the cost of
generating electricity is the same around the clock. Of course, that is not
true, but flat volumetric pricing of electricity sends that erroneous signal.
There are many ways to flatten peak demand and encourage
more energy usage which can be satisfied with the clean energy provided by
hydro and nuclear plants. One of the simplest ways, as discovered in Glasgow,
Kentucky, is to price electric power at the actual hourly cost of generating
that energy. Glasgow learned that real cost-based pricing did a good job of flattening
demand, and since Glasgow gets its electric power from TVA, a large utility
that still produces most of its power by burning fossil fuels like coal and
natural gas (40% nuclear, 45% coal and natural gas, 11% hydro, the rest
solar-wind-misc.), reducing peak demand means that fossil fuels fired
generation is reduced. That also means that greenhouse gas emissions are dramatically
reduced. Of course, widespread misinformation acceptance halted Glasgow’s
progress on this front, but other utilities will continue down this path, and
EVs will carry them there even more quickly.
Many discussions about the cost of operating an EV are fully
dependent upon what that study uses as the cost of a kWh. Most 2021 EV battery
systems have a capacity of about 25 kWh. Since the charging systems have some inherent
losses, one should likely figure it will take about 30 kWh to fully charge an
EV. If that charging is done at one’s home, using flat kWh rates, the present cost
to accomplish this charge, in the TVA region, is about $3.40. But there is a
lot more to the story. If that charging takes place during peak hours, then the
cost to the utility might be more like $100 when they pay their wholesale energy
provider. Local utilities would not be able to survive a lot of that! That is
why cost-based retail rates must come. Further, if that charging occurs during
peak hours, it is certain that the status quo methods employed by the utilities
would produce just as much greenhouse gas production as burning regular gas in
a vehicle powered by an internal combustion engine. So, regardless of the
simple economics, EVs cannot help us reduce our carbon footprint if they are
simply introduced into the present electric grid system. The grid, the retail
rates, and the thinking about electric power must all evolve too.
A central element of an evolved electric gid must be storage
of electric energy when an excess is available. Solar can harvest energy from
the sun and, if equipped with battery systems, can store that energy for use
during peak hours. EVs can become a huge part of that evolution. While Glasgow
EPB learned how to implement battery energy storage, using 11kWh battery
systems attached to homes, the units were expensive and clunky. Tomorrow we can
use EVs to accomplish that same storage with the added benefit of being able to
drive them around! None of the studies or economic analysis of EVs (at least
none that this author has read) discuss this exciting possibility. If a local
electric utility implements cost-based rates and net metering as EVs come to
town, then the technology is available to combine those elements into an
evolved electric power ecosystem that will drastically reduce greenhouse gas
emissions, reduce the overall cost of electric power, and rewrite the rules for
our locomotion.
