California needs to charge electric vehicles during day, not night, to save grid, study says

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GRA

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https://www.latimes.com/california/...ic-vehicles-daytime-charging-power-grid-study


Was busy so didn't post this last month when announced - I figured someone else would but that didn't happen, so here it is:

To successfully ramp up Californians’ reliance on electric vehicles over the next decade without overtaxing the state’s power grid, more drivers will need to charge their cars during the day, a Stanford study has found.

The state needs to drastically increase and improve public and workplace charging infrastructure that supports daytime charging, which can better utilize solar energy, according to the study, published this week in the scientific journal Nature Energy. Increased charging availability will also make electric vehicle ownership more accessible, the study found.

“If we focus a lot of attention on building out a big public charging network wherever people are during the day — at work, in public places … that will be a big win for the grid,” said Siobhan Powell, the lead researcher on the study.

The study, part of Stanford’s Bits & Watts Initiative, which integrates researchers with leaders of the energy industry, used modeling to forecast EV charging demands in 2035 across 11 Western states, including California. Projecting that both EV use and renewable energy reliance will increase over the next 13 years, the team found that improvements in public charging infrastructure — reducing dependence on nighttime power-ups — could ensure that plug-in vehicles have the least effect on the power grid.

EV owners are likely to be in high-income brackets and to charge their batteries at home overnight — often taking advantage of incentives offered by power companies to do so. If those charging habits persist as EV use greatly expands, peak electricity demand could be increased by up to 25%, the researchers found.

Though a shift to more daytime charging is not expected to stem the increase in demand, it would move the peak to when California has historically had excess capacity on the grid, thanks to solar power. This shift could also help the West prepare for high stress on its electricity system during heat waves, which continue to push the grid to its limits.

By 2035, the year California has committed to ending the sale of new fossil-fuel-burning vehicles, increased capacity will make daytime solar energy cheaper, said Ram Rajagopal, co-author of the study and an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering and electrical engineering at Stanford.

“Workplace charging, in particular, happens to line up really well with solar generation,” added Powell.

Scaling up stations that support daytime charging would “improve the impacts of EV charging, support equitable widespread adoption, reduce emissions, support renewable integration and smooth the transition to a decarbonized future,” the study found.

“Building out a lot of public daytime charging will be beneficial for the grid but also can help bring charging access to more people,” Powell said.

She acknowledges that the state needs “millions more” charging stations to reach its goal of 5 million zero-emission vehicles on the road by 2030 — almost five times the current amount. But she’s hopeful that the research can help shape policy about how and where the stations are implemented.

The findings do not mean people should stop charging EVs at home and overnight if that works best for them, Powell said, because the priority should be encouraging the use of lower- or zero-emission vehicles. But she would like to see the study influence policymakers or companies that build charging stations. That way, “it can be the convenient choice for people to charge at that time when it’s better for the grid,” Powell said.

Rajagopal, who is director of the Stanford Sustainable Systems Labs, said it could help to have people start to get into the habit of charging during the day.

“If we get people used to the right behavior now, then when that transition completes, we will already be doing the right thing,” he said.


Direct link to Nature Energy article: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41...7555&CJEVENT=2903ed733b5011ed83fc02ab0a1c0e11
 
Title of topic is misleading. Right now, California needs to charge electric vehicles by night.

In 2030 or 2035, or when ever it is that solar is producing a large enough surplus and there is enough utility battery storage to cover the evening peak, it will become important to shift the hours of EV charging to the daytime in California, and other places with large solar and not enough wind.


California needs shift charging electric vehicles to the day, stating in about 2030, study says


This has been mentioned before in MNL. LIke, a decade ago or so.
 
What the study says is that we need to direct infrastructure investments away from home charging and emphasize public and workplace charging, so that as the number of PEVs increase and the owner base diversifies away from the high-income, single family home-owning early adopters that now make up the majority of owners, we won't overload the grid (while also saving a bunch of money), especially as we'll also be shifting home heating and cooling away from NG to electricity in the same period, which are evening peak loads.

Feel free to read the study at the link provided, which details all the various scenarios e.g. universal home charging; high home; low home/high workplace etc. and their effects on storage requirements and demand.
 
I saw this weeks ago.

Lots of misleading stuff tossed around using this as a source, and don't forget this is California in the future, and that much of the rest of the country is different. And California will be different for a decade or more.

Yes, do read the fine article. Carefully.
 
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