Tag Archives: resilience

Electric vehicles as the next smartphone

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In 2006 a cell phone was portable phone that could send text messages. It was convenient but not transformative. No one seriously thought about dropping their landlines.

And then the iPhone arrived. Almost overnight consumers began to use it like their computer. They emailed, took pictures and sent them to their friends, then searched the web, then played complex games and watched videos. Social media exploded and multiple means of communicating and sharing proliferated. Landlines (and cable) started to disappear, and personal computer sales slowed. (And as a funny side effect, the younger generation seemed to quit talking on the phone.) The cell phone went from a means of one-on-one communication to a multi-faceted electronic tool that has become our pocket computer.

The U.S. population owning a smartphone has gone from 35% to 85% in the last decade. We could achieve similar penetration rates for electric vehicles (EVs) if we rethink and repackage how we market EVs to become our indispensable “energy management tool.” EVs can offer much more than conventional cars and we need to facilitate and market these advantages to sell them much faster.

EV pickups with spectacular features are about to be offered. These EVs may be a game changer for a different reason than what those focused on transportation policy think of–they offer households the opportunity for near complete energy independence. These pick ups have both enough storage capacity to power a house for several days and are designed to supply power to many other uses, not just driving. Combined with solar panels installed both at home and in business lots, the trucks can carry energy back and forth between locations. This has an added benefit of increasing reliability (local distribution outages are 15 times more likely than system levels ones) and resilience in the face of increasing extreme events.

This all can happen because cars are parked 90-95% of the time. That offers power source reliability in the same range as conventional generation, and the dispersion created by a portfolio of smaller sources further enhances that availability. Another important fact is that the total power capacity for autos on California’s road is over 2,000 gigawatts. Compared to California’s peak load of about 63 gigawatts, this is more than 30 times more capacity than we need. If we simply get to 20% penetration of EVs of which half have interconnective control abilities, we’ll have three times more capacity than we would need to meet our highest demands. There are other energy management issues, but solving them are feasible when we realize there will not be a real physical constraint.

Further, used EV batteries can be used as stationary storage, either in home or at renewable generation to mitigate transmission investments. EVs can transport energy between work and home from solar panels.

The difference between these EVs and the current models is akin to the difference between flip phones and smart phones. One is a single function device and the we use the latter to manage our lives. The marketing of EVs should shift course to emphasize these added benefits that are not possible with a conventional vehicle. The barriers are not technological, but only regulatory (from battery warranties and utility interconnection rules).

As part of this EV marketing focus, automakers should follow two strategies, both drawn from smart phones. The first is that EV pick ups should be leased as a means of keeping model features current. It facilitates rolling out industry standards quickly (like installing the latest Android update) and adding other yet-more attractive features. It also allows for more environmentally-friendly disposal of obsolete EVs. Materials can be more easily recycled and batteries no longer usable for driving (generally below 70% capacity) can be repurposed for stand-alone storage.

The second is to offer add on services. Smart phone companies have media streaming, data management and all sorts of other features beyond simple communication. Automakers can offer demand management to lower, or even eliminate, utility bills and appliance and space conditioning management placed onboard so a homeowner need not install a separate system that is not easily updated.

Outages highlight the need for a fundamental revision of grid planning

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The salience of outages due to distribution problems such as occurred with record heat in the Pacific Northwest and California’s public safety power shutoffs (PSPS) highlights a need for a change in perspective on addressing reliability. In California, customers are 15 times more likely to experience an outage due to distribution issues rather than generation (well, really transmission outages as August 2020 was the first time that California experienced a true generation shortage requiring imposed rolling blackouts—withholding in 2001 doesn’t count.) Even the widespread blackouts in Texas in February 2021 are attributable in large part due to problems beyond just a generation shortage.

Yet policymakers and stakeholders largely focus almost solely on increasing reserve margins to improve reliability. If we instead looked the most comprehensive means of improving reliability in the manner that matters to customers, we’d probably find that distributed energy resources are a much better fit. To the extent that DERs can relieve distribution level loads, we gain at both levels and not just at the system level with added bulk generation.

This approaches first requires a change in how resource adequacy is defined and modeled to look from the perspective of the customer meter. It will require a more extensive analysis of distribution circuits and the ability of individual circuits to island and self supply during stressful conditions. It also requires a better assessment of the conditions that lead to local outages. Increased resource diversity should lead to improved probability of availability as well. Current modeling of the benefits of regions leaning on each other depend on largely deterministic assumptions about resource availability. Instead we should be using probability distributions about resources and loads to assess overlapping conditions. An important aspect about reliability is that 100 10 MW generators with a 10% probability of outage provides much more reliability than a single 1,000 MW generator also with a 10% outage rate due to diversity. This fact is generally ignored in setting the reserve margins for resource adequacy.

We also should consider shifting resource investment from bulk generation (and storage) where it has a much smaller impact on individual customer reliability to lower voltage distribution. Microgrids are an example of an alternative that better focuses on solving the real problem. Let’s start a fundamental reconsideration of our electric grid investment plan.