Dealing with a 100% electrical automobile (EV) situation would require important upgrades and modifications to the prevailing electrical grid, however how a lot? And the way does that examine to historic grid progress? We’ll begin with an estimate of the extra grid capability wanted for a completely electrified light-duty automobile (LDV) fleet within the US after which examine that to historic grid growth to get an thought of how disruptive this conversion might be.

Further power wanted for 100% electrical automobile fleet

We’ll begin with an aggressive however achievable conversion to 100% electrical automobiles by 2040. To make a tough estimation of the ensuing grid demand, we have to multiply whole automobile miles traveled instances power used per mile. A dependable supply for automobile miles traveled is the Nationwide Transportation Statistics report issued by the U.S. Division of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Desk 1-35 — U.S. Car-Miles lists miles traveled for a full vary of auto varieties. For this text, we’ll give attention to “gentle responsibility automobiles,” which incorporates vehicles and vehicles, and use probably the most present information from 2021.

There may be a variety of electrical automobile sizes and powertrain designs with a spread of efficiencies. I selected 360 Wh/mile, which occurs to be the typical utilized by our Tesla Mannequin Y over 47,000 miles between September 2020 and April 2023. This automobile is a mid-sized crossover format that’s mid-range between a compact financial system automotive and a full-size pickup. Our automobile use is eighteen,000 miles per yr, with a number of high-speed freeway driving and overlaying three winters (in Minnesota) and two summers — so it’s greater than typical for this automobile. As with an inside combustion automobile, power use/mile contains all power makes use of, from shifting the automobile down the highway, to local weather management, battery conditioning, and all different power utilized by the automobile when driving.

Utilizing present information as inputs avoids making an attempt to foretell the long run relating to each private transportation use and the effectivity of future electrical automobiles. We’ll additionally add a charging effectivity worth of 90%, which is an affordable estimate of the distinction between what’s put into the automobile when charging and what it makes use of for driving, to raised signify grid demand (charging power). Car power utilized in driving is split by this quantity to supply the equal charging power.

With all inputs decided, we are actually able to calculate the full further grid capability wanted for a 100% electrical gentle responsibility automobile fleet within the U.S.

Some 835,000 odd GWh seems like loads, which shouldn’t be stunning because it replaces a big proportion of crude oil mining, transportation, refinery operation, gasoline distribution, and combustion in automobiles wanted to function at present’s inside combustion light-duty fleet.

To get a way of the magnitude of the wanted further grid capability, we are going to: 1) add this quantity to 2020 grid demand to simulate 2040 demand, 2) calculate the proportion of grid demand progress, and three) examine the magnitude of historic progress in US electrical energy demand over 20 yr intervals from 1920 to 2020. This era covers over 99% of the US grid buildout to this point.

US grid demand progress over time

The US electrical grid has undergone steady progress and enchancment since creation within the late nineteenth century. Inhabitants progress, financial improvement, new electrical energy end-uses, and technological developments (effectivity, sensible grid) have all been main drivers. The next desk lists approximate US electrical grid demand in 20 yr increments during the last 100 years.

There are a number of attention-grabbing issues to notice on this desk. First, the typical progress within the 20-year intervals proven has been over 200%. This progress has slowed in current many years, however earlier progress reveals what the US is able to when financial circumstances are proper. With this historic data, we are actually able to put the 100% EV automobile fleet within the context of the incremental grid progress wanted to assist it.

100% electrical automobile grid demand in context

Including the incremental demand from a 100% electrical LDV fleet of 835,000 GWh/yr to the 2020 estimate and making use of that to 2040 grid demand yields a 20-year progress of 21% as proven under.

Twenty-one % progress equates to a compound annual progress fee of simply 0.95%. Because the historic demand progress desk above reveals, solely the newest interval had decrease than 20% progress (8%). All prior intervals have been greater, and the typical 20 yr progress fee over 100 years from 1920–2020 was 230%.

Takeaways and extra components

Clearly, the reply to the query posed within the title is: “Simply, even with US financial funding within the grid effectively under the historic progress fee.” However there’s a full vary of further alternatives past simply constructing sufficient further grid capability to deal with the rise in electrical energy demand from 100% LDV electrification.

Take into account the next:

• Electrical automobiles might be programmed to cost when grid demand from different hundreds is low (demand response).

• Electrical automobiles are primarily charged at dwelling, the place putting in photo voltaic panels can allow charging immediately with solar energy with no internet load on the grid.

• Electrical automobile batteries retailer sufficient power to provide a typical dwelling for a number of days.

Solely present, mature applied sciences are wanted for all of those, which suggests solely regulatory boundaries and enterprise inertia within the power and transportation sectors stand in the best way. The above and different components might be explored in Half 2.

This submit initially appeared on Let’s Go Zero Carbon.