By John Ballard
Damn. I hate it when that happens.
Got up early and expected to cruise along eating popcorn, watching the movie, and what happens? I come across yet another "must read" from a source that I respect. Now I have to print out and read eleven pages of wonky prose by Krugman.
Crap. This isn't the way I had this morning organized...Here's what's happening...
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I've been getting hyped about electricity. Been reading Got Sun? Go Solar by Rex Ewing and Doug Pratt, a quick, readable, user-friendly little book recommended for anyone wanting to build or retrofit a residence for smart energy use (solar or wind). Checking back on an older post, the title of which still haunts me, I drilled into the link to see if Bill St.Arnaud said anything new.
Well yes, he has. Someone he knows is concerned about whether the existing electric grid we have is up to the task of servicing even the small number of electric vehicles that GM and others will be peddling before the end of the year.
Kim expects EV buyers to be concentrated in certain communities. Star-studded Santa Monica is already on his watch list. "We need to make sure that our local neighborhood circuits, including the transformers, are robust enough to support those additional loads," says Kim.
EVs need lots of power, especially when charged quickly. Utilities bet that most buyers will want a 240-volt charger that can "fill the tank" of a modest-size EV in 2 to 3 hours, four times as fast as a standard 120-V charger can. Such "AC Level 2" chargers, as defined by the Society of Automotive Engineers' emerging J1772 standard, draw up to 6.6 kilowatts. Turning one on is like adding up to three homes to a neighborhood, and that's with the air conditioning, lights, and laundry running.Turning on two or three Level 2 chargers could burn out the street-level transformers that are the distribution grid's weakest link. Most utilities employ undersized transformers, which are designed to cool overnight. Without time to cool, sustained excess current will eventually cook a transformer's copper windings, causing a short and blacking out the local loads it serves. LINK
That's unsettling. I know our electric infrastructure is as old and full of holes as everything else in the country but I hadn't thought about this particular snag. I suppose in the same way we wait for people to get killed before we fix bridges or build better flood walls (or require oil wells to have better safety backups) we will have to learn the hard way that the national electric grid also needs to be modernized and streamlined. Seems like the president mentioned that early in his campaign and keeps repeating it, but his words are dismissed as rhetoric for a flock of environmentalists.
Checking further, the same Bill St. Arnaud also points to something Krugman wrote April 5, calling it a "must read." So that's now on my to-do list. I'll get back to you if it proves to be as interesting as he says. Meantime, be sure to do due diligence before you spring for an electric car.
Between now and then, here's another exciting vision to keep you alert to the future of electric transportation, Bernard Avishai's The Connected Car.
There's a lesson here for government, whose pedestrian duty, as Adam Smith wrote, is to "facilitate commerce in general." To facilitate the auto industry in particular, the federal government will need to anticipate a new division of labor among car companies, electric utilities, and, crucially, the layer of new companies that will tie the former two together. Smartening the grid will mean, collaterally, transforming energy infrastructure in virtually every neighborhood; as President Obama never tires of reminding us, green energy means businesses creating jobs here, not sending them overseas. So governments at all levels must get over what once seemed a clear distinction between manufacturing and information services, or automotive jobs and construction jobs. They must seek to expand employment less by helping original-equipment manufacturers, or OEMs, to grow and more by encouraging small software and components suppliers to launch.�
Consider the lowly plug, the basic connection to the grid. A Japanese company called Yazaki developed a new design for recharging from virtually any wiring up to 240 volts. (The Volt will recharge in eight to 10 hours at 110 volts, in three hours at 220.) The design is now supported by all OEMs with electric cars in the pipeline, including Chrysler, Ford, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Mercedes-Benz, and Tesla. It carries the name SAE J1772. This may seem a humdrum development, but it is hardly that: By comparison, cell-phone makers agreed only this past June, and under pressure from the European Union, to a standard for charging handsets through a micro-USB cable.
Ultimately, SAE J1772 will stimulate development of infrastructure companies of all shapes and sizes: installation of metered outlets in home garages, say, or even robotic solutions. Think of the way, back in 1993, the EPA mandated that the port -- the interface connector -- to the engine's main computer be of a standard size, so that every mechanic's scanner could be manufactured and programmed to handle all cars. The goal was to make it possible for local garages to check cars for a yearly roadworthiness sticker. But the standard also reinvigorated competition in after-warranty car repair, because it gave those local garages access to any car's digital systems. Today, 70 percent of such repairs are handled by independent shops. [JB. Remember who was president in 1993? That was during Clinton's first 100 days. Just saying...And incidentally, one of my sons-in-law is a certified auto mechanic who owns and operates his own garage and my Dad was a career mechanic. This subject is close to my heart.]�
This focus on suppliers, where the focus belongs, frames the role of government. Yes, the Obama administration has engineered a rise in CAFE standards -- targets for vehicle miles per gallon -- and the House has passed a cap-and-trade energy bill that, if passed by the Senate, will almost certainly pressure energy companies to increase renewable sources of energy. But I got the sense from talking to Posawatz that improving the mileage of internal combustion engines is like improving the storage capacity of tape cassettes. It is much more important, he thinks, that governments at all levels help the base technologies of batteries, components, and the smart grid get off the ground, and also help enforce technical standards, like SAE J1772, to engender a settled environment in which an array of supplier start-ups can compete.
Whoever says that Barack Obama doesn't know what's happening is simply not paying attention. No Drama Obama pushes the envelope as far as he can reasonably do so. He takes a pile of criticism for that "reasonable" part, but over time he will be remembered as a good and effective president.
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