This is turning into a series of diaries.
It started out when I started seeing all these “carbon-free by 2050” plans coming from US utility companies.
How will Arizona Public Service get to zero carbon?
APS will achieve the new goals largely through increasing use of solar, including large-scale power plants with batteries.
Guldner said advancing energy storage will be key. That includes storing power on the grid with technologies like lithium-ion batteries and storing energy from season to season. Renewable energy from solar and wind is ample in spring, but power demand from customers is highest in summer.
I figured that would cost lots of money, but all you need to do is build high voltage transmission lines from where the power is generated to where the power is needed and build solar and wind farms everywhere! Done! Easy!
Well, it sounds easy. But in reality, there are lot of things that will need to change for solar and wind to be able to replace carbon based power plants. It’s not impossible, but it is not going to be easy. There is lots of work to do, not only in development of technologies, but in rethinking how everything with wind and solar is done today.
Going carbon free will mean a complete redesign of the power grid, going from centralized generation (large GW power plants) to decentralized power generation spread over a wide region, will require rethinking most aspects of generation, transmission, distribution and the power markets.
I was going to write about energy storage next, but realized I need to write about the coming changes in Supply and Demand first. Energy storage will play a big part in managing this.
Let’s take a look at Supply and Demand and Peak Hour Electricity Pricing. If you don’t already have to use Peak Hour Electricity Pricing, you will be within 10 years.
Tip: If you have a kid in school, you may want to encourage him/her to get into electrical engineering! Civil and Mechanical engineers will be very busy too.
Or, save the big fancy college money, and send them to a vocational high school if your district has one, then to your local community college for an Associates Degree and to a union hall for training to be an electrician. We are gonna need lots of electricians! In my area, and I’m sure many other areas, there is a shortage of electricians now. Electrical contractors are having a hard time keeping up with the workload today. Going carbon-free is going to make them even busier.
It is a great career opportunity right out of high school for kids with vocational training. It takes years of on the job training to become a licensed electrician. They can’t just hire anyone off the street to fill jobs. Kids coming out of high school today with a background in electrical via vocational schools have a head start and are sought after for apprenticeship programs. Apprenticeship programs are just as long as Bachelors degree programs, but your kid will be well paid (+ overtime!) instead of you writing large checks to their school. The National Electrical Code is very complex and electricians must know it very well. They even have a Masters Degree.
PEAK HOUR ELECTRICITY PRICING
Today, electric power is much cheaper at night when demand is down. The reason for that is the large “always on” power plants like nuclear and coal plants. These plants can’t shutdown and restart on a whim. They produce power at night whether it is needed or not. Once the coal plants shutdown. There won’t be much spare capacity left at night. Solar will be relied on heavily and we won’t be getting any solar generation at night. This will shift excess generation capacity to the late morning thru the late afternoon hours from late evening thru early morning.
Wind and geothermal will help, but not enough. Geothermal isn’t available everywhere. Wind locations are limited and generation is not always guaranteed. Hydro and Nuclear plants will help, but no one wants to build new ones and the trend is more toward decommissioning nuclear plants and dam removal.
My electric (and gas) utility, Ameren, has their “Power Smart Pricing” Real Time Pricing rate plan. Prices are determined by the electricity “spot” market. Prices are not available until the day before and can fluctuate based on weather and other conditions. They skyrocketed back in February with the Texas natural gas fiasco, for example.
Many areas use the Real Time Pricing (RTP) or Time of Use (ToU) rate plan for electricity. Customers can choose to join this plan and shift their power usage to off peak hours. These types of plans are the only options in many areas, especially outside the US.
ToU rate plans are similar to RTP rate plans, but based on blocks of time, not hourly. Southern California Edison has ToU plans that are more workable and prices are set for summer and winter well in advance.
For example, you can get a 4pm-9pm plan where power is 43¢ weekdays (35¢ weekends) 4-9pm and 27¢ per KWh during all other times during the summer. Cheaper peak rates for winter months, with a slightly lower than summer rate for 8am-4pm and a slightly higher than summer rate for 9pm-8am. (OMG! My supply price is 4.29¢ per KWh 24/7! About 11.25¢ per KWh with transmission and taxes! 9¢ in winter!)
They have another similar plan, but the time is 5-8pm and the peak rate is much higher, same off peak rate. Winter is similar, but a little lower off-peak AM and a little higher off-peak PM rates from the 4-9pm plan.
This is more workable than the Ameren rate option we have. With the SCE ToU plan, the prices are known well in advance and the peak rate times are easier to work with for more people.
SCE also has a rate for electric vehicle owners, “residential batteries” and electric heat/ hot water. Off peak rates are much cheaper with this plan:
These rate plans give customers the incentive to charge their cars and “residential batteries” after 9pm. These cause a heavy load on the grid, so they don’t want them charging during otherwise peak usage hours.
Many large industrial users take advantage of this kind of pricing if they can shift their heavier power loads to off peak hours.
Once coal plants go offline and they are replaced with renewables and storage, power at night will not be so plentiful and will be more expensive when drawn from storage. Besides the cost of the batteries and the extra generation needed to charge them, we also have a lot of lost power in the charging/storing/discharging process. When we are talking GWh of battery stored power this loss adds up quick. We will have more electricity put into storage than will be output from storage. Customers will be discouraged from using large amounts of power at night. Nighttime rates will go up.
Daytime hours will have extra generation from solar and prices will come down. It is cheaper to use the solar power when it is generated than it is to store it and transmit it at night. Customers will be encouraged to use power during the peak solar generation hours of the day.
The utilities will have no choice but to move everyone to rate plans similar to the SCE ToU plans. Rate plans like Ameren’s will have to change. We can’t throw everyone into the day to day spot market because Mr Peabody’s friends at Enron will show up and then the markets become spotty and aren’t so free. Prices will skyrocket on cloudy or rainy days in areas with high solar generation, and they will skyrocket on windless days in areas with high wind generation.
DISTRIBUTED SOLAR AND BATTERIES WILL BE EVERYWHERE
How will residences and businesses shift their power usage? Batteries. Batteries will be developed that can be tied into their electrical service entrance (at the meter), similar to a standby generator, but could be on the utility side of the meter. And solar panels will be everywhere, HOAs be damned!. If you can put a solar panel on it, there will be a solar panel on it with a battery. Traffic light poles, street light poles, roofs.
Over the last few years, Ameren has been replacing the old school street lights in my area with LED lights when they burn out. Besides the brighter light, you can tell them apart because the old ones have large, fat heads and the new ones are thin and flat. In 2030, they will be replacing street lights with the large, fat head style, but this time they will be an LED light, battery and small solar panel. A larger solar panel will be mounted on the pole. Every Watt Will Count.
Traffic light poles and arms will be fitted with solar panels and they will find ways to stuff batteries in existing signal control boxes. New boxes will be designed with battery space.
Residences, companies and communities will be encouraged to generate some of their own power and store power onsite. In the last diary, I calculated the amount of land needed for solar panels. Solar farms today are using about 8 acres for 1MW. 1GW works out to 12.5 mi2 (8,000 acres). They will need to find land for batteries or build tall buildings to house them. They are going to be looking to place solar panels and batteries anywhere they can find.
Utilities could develop incentive programs similar to the ones they have for HVAC upgrades and LED bulbs. Federal and State tax credits could be offered as well.
The batteries could be charged with power from both the grid and the solar panels. These batteries could be controlled by the utility via their “smart meter” technology. They would be able to tell the battery when to draw power from the grid and when to discharge to provide power to the building or street/traffic lights. This would allow the utility to shift the load as needed.
No more rolling blackouts. No more blackouts due to high voltage lines being shutdown for days because of fire risk. No more power outages after storms. All customers would have several days or even weeks of onsite electricity storage.
By using the land the buildings sit on for solar generation and their customer’s land for the batteries, the utilities would not have to buy as many sq miles of farmland. The utilities and others in the solar generation/storage industry would pay to install them and would own the equipment.
Rollout could be in conjunction with roof replacement. As houses and businesses need to do major roof repairs or replace roofs, the owner would pay what it would cost to install a normal roof. The utilities would then pay for the solar roof and battery installation. The roof would be 100% modular roofing panels that has solar panels and wiring built in. The battery would be installed at the customers meter at the same time.
The solar and battery would be owned and maintained by the utility and would be attached to the property, not the owner of the property. The property gets a cheap rate for the power they consume that is generated by the solar panels for the life of the panels. If they need to draw power from the grid, they pay a special battery customer grid rate which would be much cheaper than normal grid rate since the utility would be controlling the storage.
Batteries will be developed for apartments and condos too. Batteries that could be a base unit for a washer/dryer could be popular. Wall units that get attached to a closet wall could be used.
The Federal and State governments could offer tax credits to help offset the installation costs where there is no other choice but to install them indoors. Some older homes may need electrical service upgrades to have batteries/solar tied in to meet today’s code. Tax credits would help offset any other related upgrade costs to the homeowner, business and apartment complexes.
Over the last few years, a company has been selling these Vanadium Flow Batteries. Their customers use them to store power from the grid during cheap power times and discharge them during peak power times.
They are also being used by off-grid customers to store renewable energy and provide frequency control instead of running the large diesel/oil based generators 24/7. The battery provides cheaper power than trucking in the diesel/oil and storing it (or shipping it in tankers for islands).
Since they can provide frequency control, some customers are using them to provide power during extended blackouts as well.
In November 2020, The Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians installed a 0.5 MWh Vanadium Flow Battery with 50 kW of on-site solar generation to provide a minimum of ten hours continuous backup power to their fire station which serves as the incident command center and emergency shelter as well as the point of distribution for food, equipment and supplies during wildfires. Now, if power is cut off due to a fire, they have onsite storage and power generation to get them thru the event.
Long-duration energy storage technologies such as flow batteries will be increasingly vital to stabilizing electricity grids and creating a reliable, resilient energy system as more renewable power is generated. Long-duration batteries soak up excess power and discharge it back into the grid for sustained periods when renewable generation is low or demand on the grid is high. Vanadium flow batteries have a service life exceeding 20 years even in heavy-duty daily usage, delivering better project economics for energy-shifting applications than comparable lithium-ion batteries.
Storage technology will need to be improved before we start seeing this on a large scale. Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries are well positioned for this type of application because of their 20 year life, no degradation after many charge/discharge cycles, and ability to sit empty or full for long periods of time.
Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries (VRFB) are expensive now, but as the technology improves and production ramps up, they will become just as common (if not more common) than natural gas home standby generators. In 10 years they won’t be selling new natural gas or propane standby power, it will be some type of battery storage (and probably not L-Ion).
Invinity Energy Systems has VRFBs ranging from refrigerator sized up to shipping container sized. 78kW – 10MW output, 220 kWh – 40 MWh duration. Storage duration dictates the size of the unit. For example, if you had the smallest unit, 78kW/220kWh, you could output 78kW for 2.8 hours. A 10MW/40MWh unit would give you 10MW output for 4 hours.
In 2021 VRBs are quite large for the storage they provide. As the electrolytes used to store power is improved over the years, size has gotten much smaller. When it comes time to replace my standby generator in about 10 years, it will probably be replaced with a flow battery, for the same price the standby generators go for today, take up the same space and provide a week’s worth of power.
RESIDENTIAL BATTERIES AND SMART METERS
I have a 12kW natural gas standby generator with load shedding (it can put out 14kW on propane). If I try to draw more than 12kW, it will drop the biggest power draws, like the HVAC, Range and Dryer. The only time load shedding was activated was when I was testing it. But it is important, because if I try to draw too much power from the generator, frequency will drop and appliances and other electronics will blow. They don’t like that.
I have 200 Amp electric service, 48 KW. The main breaker will blow if the house uses more than 48 KW. I think even if i turned on everything in the house, I wouldn’t hit 200 Amps (until I get an electric car). A 48KW battery would be the same size as my electric service. If I still had 100 Amp service I would use a 24KW unit. Load shedding would not be necessary.
I use about 50kWh per day on the hottest summer days, so 300 kWh of storage would give me 6 days without power during a heat wave. Twice as long during the winter. (much less time if I charge my car tho!)
The amount of storage needed would be calculated for each residence based on electric usage for a summer day. If flow batteries are used, they last 20 years or more. They would be made expandable, so that additional storage could be added easily. L-Ion batteries will be made so they can easily be grouped or stacked to add more storage overtime and the batteries inside the L-Ion units will be easily replaceable and upgradable to whatever-Ion technology is used when those batteries are end of life (right now, about 10 years).
They could probably make a L-Ion home standby battery with those specs now and it would fit in the same spot that my standby generator uses.
There are small wall mounted L-Ion units being sold with solar systems now. The new electric F-150 can act as a standby generator or even a job/camp site generator (glamping with your SUV will be a thing).
The F-150 Lightning has an optional 9.6KW output. You’d need to install a separate device similar to a portable standby generator’s manual transfer switch in addition to the 80amp charger to power your house. They will need some kind of load shed kit to prevent overloads and frequency drops if you tried to power the whole house. A subpanel that allows only certain circuits to be powered by the car maybe needed (what a typical portable standby gasoline or propane generator uses).
Besides providing standby power, the residential battery could also allow me to draw power from the grid during the cheapest times and discharge it during the more expensive pricing hours. I could also install rooftop solar to help charge the battery. This would be a “behind the meter” application, or customer side. I would own all the equipment and be responsible for maintenance.
Or utilities could decide that instead of leasing/buying land and building solar/battery farms that it is cheaper to build out solar on their customers roofs and place batteries on their customers properties. Customers would get a much cheaper rate and be guaranteed that they will have standby power eliminating power outages for them. This would be installed on the utility side of the meter and the solar panels and battery owned and maintained by the utility (or an electric supply company).
In either case, the utility would control the batteries through the same smart meters they are using now. Everything would be tied together via a combination ATS/meter box.
The picture above is my standby generator. The Automatic Transfer Switch (ATS) and meter box are on the back wall. The generator is about the same height, but a litter narrower and a foot or two longer than my HVAC compressor. There is underground conduit running from the generator to the ATS and into the house near the electrical panel. (The conduit sticking up next to the gen is for electric for a future outdoor kitchen counter w/ built in grill. Someday… But it was easier to put in the conduit when the generator was installed than to dig another 18” deep trench later!)
There are rules that must be followed when installing a gas standby generator. It must be 5 ft from a building made of combustible material or windows/vents. The intake and exhaust have clearances as well. So the location where it is was the only option, unless I wanted to dig dozens of feet of trenches for gas lines and electric.
A flow battery could have been installed on the ground abutting the building under the meter box and connected to the box via a short piece of flex conduit like the HVAC compressor. Much easier installation and more choices for location (even indoors). L-Ion units are being sold with solar systems for home standby now. They are wall mounted. L-Ion batteries are prone to fire tho, so I’m not so sure I’d be doing that. But Graphene aluminum ion batteries seem to be much safer. No one knows what battery technology will be king in 2030.
The picture to the right is the overhead electrical entrance to my house. The generator’s Automatic Transfer Switch (ATS) is on the left and the meter box is on the right.
Before the upgrade, power left the meter box in conduit straight down into the house. On the other side of the wall in the basement is the electrical panel.
Today, power from the meter goes into the ATS, then from the ATS to the electrical panel in the basement. Power leaves the ATS in the 2” PVC conduit that goes into the wall to the electric panel below the meter box. The generator sends it’s power into the ATS as well. In normal operation, the switch inside the ATS is connected to the utility input.
When the ATS detects a power outage, it disconnects the utility power and connects the generator power while sending a signal to the generator to start. When it detects utility power is back on, it resets the switch from the generator power to the utility power source and sends a signal to the generator to stop.
While doing the work to install the generator, I also did a 100Amp to 200Amp upgrade with new electrical panel inside. Ameren made me upgrade the meter box. The meter itself was already a smart meter, but they require the meter box be upgraded with the latest safety features during electric service upgrades. A couple of years ago they had a program to upgrade meter boxes and had a few of the local electricians busy swapping out meter boxes at customer homes on their own dime.
Installing the generator didn’t have to be this complicated. If I could have gotten a new meter box with the ATS built in, I could have just swapped out the meter box and connected the generator to that. But they don’t exist. ATS units are manufacturer specific, I can’t install a Generac generator using the Kohler ATS. And vice versa. And when it is time to replace the Kohler gen in 10 years or so, that ATS will most likely need to be upgraded as well to work with the latest Kohler generators (which will probably be batteries by then!).
In 2030, utilities will do just that. They will replace the meter box and tie solar panels and batteries into the new meter box, then the batteries could be controlled by the utility via commands from automated smart substations via the smart meter. This will allow automation to micro manage Supply and Demand at the distribution grid level by adjusting each customers battery/grid usage. Rolling blackouts without the blackout. No more storm related power outages for customers with batteries, except in very extended circumstances.
Utility customers that purchased their own solar panels and batteries would connect into the customer side of the ATS/Meter combo. The solar panels would charge the battery with extra power. If more power is used than generated, power is drawn from the grid to keep the battery close to full, if more power is generated than is used and the battery is full, the power goes out to the grid and the customer receives a credit.
Utility customers that allowed an electric supply company to install the solar panels and batteries would connect into the utility side of the ATS/Meter combo. The solar panels would charge the battery with solar power not being used by the property. If more power is used than generated, power is drawn from the grid to keep the battery close to full, if more power is generated than is used and the battery is full, the power goes out to the grid and the utility or electric supply company receives the credit. The property owner is billed by the utility for the power they use, at a much lower rate than if they just received power from the grid, to compensate them instead of “leasing” their roof space.
That would be a huge change, but it’s 10 years away more or less. With green technology being a political issue in the US, other countries will start adopting this approach much earlier. We are already way, way behind China. To go carbon free, everything about the power grid will be changing. There really is no way around it if we want off carbon electric generation. It will mean battery storage on customer sites as well as utility sites.
Once people see the standby usage of the batteries they are being asked to install, most won’t complain. And if they don’t have to pay for the solar panels and batteries they are being asked to install and instead get a cheaper power rate, it may actually become a popular program.
Once people start realizing that these electric cars they keep hearing about are not going to cost them $100K and they actually test drive a $35K electric car, they will be dumping their gas models. Especially performance enthusiasts. With the ability to replace job site (or camp site) generators, electric pickups and SUVs will be very popular in the next few years. By 2030, more and more people will be seeing their power bills climb by 1000 KWh or more each month due to charging these cars at home! People will be wanting to have solar installed if it means cheaper power bills.
WHAT ABOUT APARTMENTS AND CONDOS?
Commercial properties and apartment complexes may decide to put up solar carports on their parking areas and solar panels on the roofs. They could sell the power to the grid and their customers/tenants by putting in car chargers built into the carport structures. Companies would even spring up that would work with property owners to build the carport/solar/batteries, then split the profits from selling the power to charge customers/tenants cars. Customers/tenants don’t have to charge their cars while parked there, so prices would be competitive with public charging stations. Convenient for the customers/tenants and they will love the covered parking.
High rise buildings and apartment complexes could put solar and batteries on their roofs and use them to power common areas. Tenants in those buildings would be limited to saving grid power only, but could still have batteries installed in their units, designed like washer/dryer pedestals, or units designed to be installed on a wall in a closet. Apartment complexes could install one outdoors at each building on the utility side before the individual meters, or even in a building utility room. The utility would use the battery to save power when it is plentiful and use it to power the building when power is out or scarce. Tenants would get a battery storage rate, cheaper than the grid power rate and be protected from short duration outages.
Incentive programs will have to be developed to help cover costs for homeowners, apartments/condos and commercial properties. “At the meter” storage is going to be key, so utilities will be providing the incentive, even if the government doesn’t.
PEAK ELECTRIC USAGE HOURS WILL BE CHANGING
Most people who live in homes where it is possible will be charging their electric vehicles overnight in their driveways and garages.
Office workers may be lucky and find a charger at every parking spot in their employers parking lot, but realistically, that will not be possible for a long time. A lot can be done by building solar carports with built in car chargers, however, to run the wiring for every spot to have a car charger would be extremely expensive. The amount of concrete/asphalt you will have to rip up and the electrical conduit and wiring will run up costs quickly. It can be required in new construction and renovations and income from the chargers will help offset the additional costs. Doing it on existing construction will be very difficult, disruptive and expensive to get even ½ the parking covered.
At the office, people will park at an available charger, first come, first served, plug the car in and there it will sit until 5pm. No one else can use the charger. They aren’t going to rush out to their cars when the app says it’s fully charged and move it to the back of the lot. Not gonna happen. And if it does, they’ll have to tap the next person on the shoulder to let them know a spot at a charger is available.
Most people in single family homes will skip the hunt for a charger when they get to work and opt for 240V car chargers in their garages or driveways for the convenience and will charge their cars overnight. That’s what I plan on doing.
If they don’t have an office and use a pickup truck to do something like, say, construction work, well, they can’t really plug it in at the office during the day.
Restaurants and shopping centers will put in fast chargers in their parking lots. People who can’t charge at home or the office will be using these after work when they stop for dinner, drinks or hit the store. Getting a quick charge while the car is parked and people are out shopping or grabbing dinner/drinks after work will become a thing. Most of this charging will happen close to or after sunset when solar generation is phasing out or done for the day.
Unless they are traveling, most people won’t be pulling into charging stations like they do gas stations. Even with the fastest DC charging, the wait time is too long. If people do charge that fast, those types of chargers suck up even more KWs! It takes 115KWh to fill an F-150s battery from 15% to 100% whether you charge it in 10 seconds or 10 hours.
If it takes 10 hours to fill, it will draw 11.5KW for 10 hours. If it takes 30 minutes to fill, it will need to draw 330 KW for 30 minutes, 15 minutes to fill, it will draw 660 KW for 15 minutes. That is a huge increase in load. It makes air conditioning look like nothing (my HVAC draws 2KW when its running).
Large fleets converting to electric vehicles as they rotate out older vehicles will bring large numbers of electric vehicles on the road. Since these are primarily used during daylight hours, they will be charging at the shop, at night while the sun is down, most likely with nearly empty batteries, adding heavy demand during night time hours where there is little demand at that time from that property today.
The same for other work vehicles, any vehicle associated with construction like plumbing, electrical and other construction contractors. Some of these outfits own hundreds of vehicles and have huge parking lots for them.
An F-150 comes with two optional “Pro Power” packages aimed at construction workers and recreational activities (camping, tailgating, etc. hell we coulda used one of these on Dead tour back in the day!). Soon other manufacturers will have similar trucks.
The F-150 has a 2.4KW version with eight 120V outlets and a 9.6kV version with ten 120V outlets and one 240V outlet. That’s pretty impressive. It can power saws, small compressors for nail guns and other tools as well as charge cordless tool batteries at job sites that have no access to electric power.
Construction workers are gonna ditch their portable generators and use the batteries on their work trucks instead. Some may opt not to even bother with temporary utility electric service during construction. They will want full batteries every morning and will use the power for more than mileage.
Electric cars and trucks will be everywhere in 10 years. It will be hard to find a gasoline model on new car lots. More and more gasoline cars will start reaching end of life and be replaced with electric models. This will increase night time power usage significantly, just as cheap nighttime power produced by always on coal plants goes offline.
It may be necessary to keep some natural gas peaking plants in some areas, but instead of running during the day, they’d be running late night into the early AM.
Who knows what storage/generation technology will be available in ten or twenty years. Maybe there will be some super-efficient storage that doesn’t take up sq miles of land that can efficiently store GWhs of power. More efficient solar panels will become available. Maybe in 2050 all we will need to do over the next 30 years would be run around upgrading all the batteries and solar panels we put in over the previous 30 years (we’re gonna be doing it anyway, end of life) and our nighttime power woes go away.
Why is this? Let’s take a look at how much power these 240V home car chargers draw and how many KWh these car batteries take to fill. Even with a roof full of solar panels and batteries to store the extra power generated, if you are charging a car, you will be drawing power from the grid.
ELECTRIC VEHICLE CHARGING USES MANY KILOWATT HOURS OF ELECTRICITY
In the graphic at the top of this diary and to the right from the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s 2015 Residential Energy Consumption Survey, there is one thing missing in the “New End users” category that didn’t really exist back then, but do now.
More and more electric car models are coming on the market. In 5 years there will be dozens to choose from. In 10 years, finding a new gasoline model will be like finding a new model with an old school manual transmission with a foot pedal clutch is today.
Many people expect to be charging their new electric cars at home at night since they work all day.
Between commuters and large fleets, this is going to cause a surge in demand of electricity overnight just as the large coal plants are being shutdown. The days of plentiful and cheap electric power overnight will be over.
How much power does it take to charge an electric vehicle? Let’s look at the Electric F-150 and the charging options that come with it:
The standard charger that comes with all electric vehicles will plug into a standard 120V wall outlet, but will take days to fully charge an empty battery. It is limited to 1.5 KW (120V, 12.5 amps).
Many people are going to be installing 240V electric charging stations in their garages. My son has looked into it for when he gets an electric car (soon) and a neighbor has already gotten it done waiting for their electric car to be delivered. If your electric panel is in the garage and there are two slots available for a two-pole breaker, it’s an easy install. $200-300 to an electrician at most. Less if the panel is surface mounted (not recessed into the wall cavity).
However, if you live in an older house with 100 amp electric service and need to charge two cars at the same time, you’ll have to upgrade to 200 amp service or use slower chargers.
Many people will be installing fast chargers. The most popular ones are the 48-amp models. They draw power in the KWs.
- 32 amps (240V, 40 amp two pole breaker) = 7.7 KW
- 48 amps (240V, 60 amp two pole breaker) = 11.5 KW
- 80 amps (240V, 100 amp two pole breaker) = 19.2 KW
I have an energy monitor installed in my electrical panel. It allows me to monitor total watts used by the entire house and for 16 individual circuits.
For comparison, my HVAC Compressor uses about 1.5 KW when it is running and the furnace blower uses 500W for a total of 2KW. If my HVAC runs continuously for 1 hour, it will use 2 KWh of electricity. My worst day was a day we broke 100 a few weeks ago. I used 50 KWh that day. A typical summer day is about 38 KWh. During my peak 15 minute average for the last 30 days I was drawing about 5 KW (I must’ve been cooking dinner while the HVAC was running).
Let’s take a look at Average Joe. He bought an F-150 Lightning with the standard battery. He drives 13,500 miles a year. About 260 miles per week on average. About 37 miles per day on average.
Average Joe lives in an average house with a 2 car garage in an average subdivision in an average suburb and commutes 30 miles per day round trip. He installed a 240V 48-Amp car charger in his garage to charge his truck. He has limited options to charge his car at work, all the charging spots are usually taken by the time he gets there. Since he has a charger in his garage, he figures why bother searching for a charging spot at work.
Average Joe doesn’t need to charge his truck everyday. Every 4 or 5 days will do depending on the weather. If it is real hot or real cold, his mileage is lower because A/C or heat use power from the battery.
Ford says the F-150 will get 230 miles on a full charge in perfect conditions. You need to charge the battery at 15% or so. So about 195 miles on a charge. Cars will do better. And over time, range will increase using the same amount of power. But for now, this is what we have to work with. We’ll call it 200 miles.
To charge the standard battery from 15% to 100% using the 240V 48-Amp home charger, it will take 10 hours. That will use 11.5KW continuously, 115KWh total. That’s a lot of power. For comparison, my HVAC uses 2KW when it runs, but it doesn’t run continuously, especially at night. I used about 1100 KWh for the month of June.
Average Joe doesn’t waste time during the day looking for places to charge his truck. He does occasionally find a charger available at a restaurant or the grocery store after work, but since he has one at home, he figures, why bother?
Most of the charging he does ends up being at home. He doesn’t wait until the battery is at 15% to charge, so he charges every 2-3 days for 5 hours a night.
He’s driving between 1000-1100 miles each month. That is 5 – 5 ½ full charges per month. We’ll just call it 5 full battery charges per month. That will be 575 KWh per month. Keep in mind, my entire house used 1100 KWh in June. 825 KWh in May. 575 KWh is about my winter monthly power usage. That’s a lot of power to charge one car. And that power will be needed at night. Multiply that by millions.
In 2024, Average Joe’s wife, Average Jane, buys an electric car. She bought a Ford E-SUV. They share the car charger, it works on both cars. Average Jane has a similar commute as Average Joe and similar annual mileage. Average Joe and Jane alternate nights that they charge their cars. That will be 1150 KWh every month. That’s about what my entire house uses per month in July and August. This power usage will be year round, not just hot summer months.
At Average Joe and Jane’s house, there will be a car charging in the two car garage just about every night drawing 11.5KW for an average of 5 hours. Now, at 3AM, instead of their household drawing 500W, it will be drawing 12 KW!
There is going the be a huge need for storage to save solar power generated during daylight to use after dark to charge electric vehicles. Previously afternoon air conditioning was the biggest reason for the need for peaking plants. In 10 years, electric car charging will make air conditioning look like nothing.
There are many different chargers on the market. You don’t need to use the Automaker’s branded charger. My son wants to get an electric car soon, so I was helping him figure out the electric needs at his house. He has been looking at this one. The 48-Amp will be the most popular. It needs a 60 amp breaker and 6/3 electrical wire. Similar to a range or subpanel. I’ll install it for him for less than $150. (6/3 wire is not cheap!). I did a double-take when I saw the amps these draw. I figured 48 Amps would fully charge a car in an hour or two, not 10!
I’ll be putting one in my garage when I get an electric car. A neighbor already has a 240V car charger. Many others will install them. The convenience of charging your car at home will justify the cost.
These chargers allow you to program them to charge only during certain times. Many people will set them to charge at night based on the amount of time they need to charge the battery overnight. Those with shorter commutes may have them start charging at 2AM, those with really long commutes 10PM.
There is no doubt there will be a large nighttime load added to the power grid over the next 10 years. Just in time for the coal plants that help provide the abundant nighttime power to go offline. Solar is a big part of the plans to replace the coal plants, and the only way to do that will be to generate more power than you need during the day with solar and save the extra to use at night.
BATTERIES WILL BE USED TO SHIFT LOAD
Eventually, as power becomes more expensive and scarcer at night, it will be necessary to save solar and other power for use at night. The Power Grid will have more generation during daylight hours than nighttime hours, so they will need people to save power everywhere they can. Incentive (utility and government) programs will be developed to encourage people and businesses to have batteries installed in the homes and and businesses.
Electric car owners will be drawing power off the grid. No house is going to have enough solar panels on the roof to charge the car battery with 115kWh every week. Residential solar and storage will be needed just to help shift some of the load of electric cars off the power grid and extra generation will be needed from the grid to charge their residential batteries. Solar power generated at residences will need to be saved for when the car is present to be used to charge the car.
It will shock a lot of people in 3-5 years when electric cars really start to come on the market and they discover that all that spare generation at night has disappeared.
One of the benefits of getting batteries “at the meter” everywhere will be, no more blackouts. They need to do rolling blackouts? No problem, everyone has several days stored on batteries. Storm go thru and knock out power? No problem, you got a battery in your home (or your truck) that can run your house for a week.
Utilities will be begging customers to let them put solar panels and batteries on their roofs and property. Cheaper than building 20 story buildings to house batteries all in one location, and finding sq miles of open land for solar farms. They will be looking for anywhere they can stuff a battery and attach a solar panel.
Utilities will control the “at the meter” batteries remotely via “smart” substations just like they where sitting on one big battery farm somewhere in the desert or a former farm field. They will use them to adjust load on the power grid at the customer level.
For example, every utility customer gets a battery big enough to fully power their premises for 8 hours or so. Customers who want longer storage times for standby power get a credit toward a bigger battery.
The utility would decide when to charge and discharge the battery. They can send a command to the battery to start charging from the grid when they have extra power, and to discharge (to that customer only, not the grid) when the grid is short of power. The utility customer doesn’t know the difference.
If customers chose larger batteries for standby power, the utility would only use the base storage for load management and the rest would always be available for standby power.
This would allow people like me, who live in subdivisions with overhead lines and mature trees, and who have natural gas generators, to replace their generators with batteries that could power the house for a week or longer. When we get a storm rip thru our neighborhood, it’s usually a spotty outage here or there for a few hours. But there was one that was widespread a couple of years ago that took out a few power lines. It took 3 days for some sections of the 1 mi2 neighborhood to get power back. I think those would be popular in areas prone to storm outages.
Battery prices will come down by the time this happens and incentive programs will be developed. The utilities are going to want these residential batteries because of the control it will give them, plus lessen their need for real estate.
Now that we talked about why we need lots of storage, the next diary will be about what storage technology utilities are being research, starting to roll out or already available.