Grid Capacity

Moderator: Jill Egbert, Pacific Gas & Electric

Mark Duvall
Electric Power Research Institute

• How many PHEV can the grid handle? Who knows and it might not matter. The electric companies have in the past been able to scale supplies of electricity to meet increasing demand so PHEV will probably be the same
• 2008 electricity usage is projected 1,400 TWh for residential use and about the same for commercial and ? for industrial. About 4,000 TW total
• Residential usage grows about 2.3% per year for the last 10 years, this is about 15 million PHEV
• Average price for electricity in US is $0.089 kWh
• Smart Grid on the consumer side is "prices to devices"
• Peak demand is growing in relation to average demand, so asset utilization is going down
• In CA, the last 5% (2,500 MW) of electricity capacity needed less than 50 hours per year. Last 25% needed less than 10% of the time.
• Wind and solar power tend to be complementary but still peak more during the day
• In 2008 will use one conductive connector standard for level 1 and level 2 charging, EVs could charge up to 15kW, which could give up to 60 miles range per hour of charging (probably more like 45)
• There could be a problem if many people in the same neighborhood buy EVs due to overloading the local electric delivery system
• Distribution system could be the biggest roadblock to EV adoption
• Smart grid will happen with or without EVs

Mike Jackson
TIAX, Senior Director of Transportation Technology

• CA has enacted various state initiatives to combat climate change
• Starting in 1990 150 Million tons (mt) from vehicles. Without doing anything would grow to almost 300 mt
• Also state initiatives for alternative fuels to 20% by 2020 and 30% by 2030
• Well-Wheels GHG emissions for midsize auto:
  • 430 g/mi for ICE
  • 300 g/mi for LNG
  • 330 g/mi for corn ethanol
  • 130 for Brazil sugar cane ethanol
  • 70 g/mi for EV with coal electricity
  • 120 g/mi using RPS electricity at night

Questions

• No standard yet for device-to-grid communication. Utilities are concerned mainly with the messaging structure, not physical or other layers. However ZigBee and HomePlug could handle these.
• Some talk of having EVs provide ancillary services instead of power plants which are more expensive. However, this is down the road because they need to solve the big problem of communication between the vehicle and grid first.
• Some organization disagree by as much as a factor of 10 as to what value EV ancillary services would generate. Part of it depends on how much time regulation services would be useful.
• Are any utilities concerned that PHEVs will overload their system? There are over 3,000 utilities in the US so there is likely to be some. However, electricity usage is growing each year anyways with or without EVs and EVs will have a relatively small impact on utilities and EV electricity storage can provide a lot of benefits as well.