Fulfilling all that pent up Tesla demand may push electricity grids beyond their limits and, ironically, lead to more emissions.
Pre-orders for the California-based electric carmaker’s Model 3 sedan – seen as its first affordable vehicle with a US$35,000 starting price – surpassed 276,000 in just three days and at last count has gone above 325,000. Each pre-order required a US$1,000 refundable deposit, meaning the Model 3 has already generated US$325 million for Tesla -- and the total payday could surpass US$13.6-billion, assuming a final purchase price of US$42,000 and that nobody cancels their order.
For perspective, slightly more than 119,000 electric vehicles were sold in the United States throughout the entirety of 2014. Tesla Model 3 pre-orders came remarkably close to tripling that annual figure in less than one week.
Whether or not Tesla is able rethink its production planning to ensure prompt delivery, the slow-but-steady adoption of emission-free electric vehicles is clearly about to rapidly accelerate. Mainstream carmakers such as General Motors are due to release Model 3 competitors such as the Chevy Bolt next year and research suggests a very strong appetite for electric vehicles among consumers.
All those new cars may not need any gasoline, but they will need electricity. Lots of it. And the prospect of so many new EVs plugging in over such a short time means there may not be enough to go around.
“With massive adoption of EVs, the power grid would require significant modernization,” Martin Ordonez, an engineering professor at the University of British Columbia and Canada Research Chair in the field of power converters for renewable energy systems, told BNN via email. “Problems begin to surface at the distribution level in congested neighbourhoods and many chargers in parallel could compromise the system.”
Canadians have long been willing buyers of plug-in electric vehicles, with a recent study finding more than one third of car buyers in this country would be open to adopting one. Despite that overall willingness, a Simon Fraser University report published last July concluded electric cars would barely make up one per cent of the total Canadian automotive market by 2020 as actual purchases -- and more importantly, the rollout of relevant infrastructure -- would likely be gradual.
If the extraordinary Tesla Model 3 demand is any indication, the number of electric cars on the road appears far more likely to outpace infrastructure development. Lacking an adequate number of charging stations and power grids capable of handling the increased loads could lead to problems.
“[Overloading] could be possible, it really depends on how the charging is done,” Bill Dunford, another engineering professor at UBC whose research focuses on energy systems, told BNN via telephone. “What will be a problem is if people want to charge up frequently during the day. When you’re talking about fast charging, that is putting more pressure on the grid.”
Charging slowly overnight would be ideal, since that’s when demands on the grid tend to be at their lowest, but that likely will not be possible right away. Many early adopters will not have their own garages or dedicated power outlets near their parking spots, which would force them to at least initially rely on so-called “fast-charging” stations in the middle of major urban centres. That would lead to major increases in electricity use during peak demand periods.
“We have had a number of parking lots in Vancouver adding electric charging stations for the few electric cars there are, and I think for those few it doesn’t make a major difference,” Dunford said. “But if you have the whole parking lot electric, it is certainly going to make a big difference and you will have to look at the infrastructure and distribution system, which is not designed to handle those sustained loads.”
Eventually, Ordonez said power grids will be modernized to the point where having large numbers of EV batteries hooked into the system will contribute to a more stable supply. Utilities will be able to “communicate” with the cars directly to only charge them during periods of low demand and take power back from the vehicles using vehicle-to-grid technology (also known as V2G) when demands on the grid peak.
That would solve the distribution problem, but Dunford points out there would still be a problem in terms of the total amount of energy consumed. According to the editor of AccurateAutoAdvice.com, switching all the gas-burning cars in the United States to EVs would require a nearly one-third increase in total electricity production.
“People think we have all the electricity we need in British Columbia,” said Dunford, “that may have been true 50 years ago but is not at all true today.”
The province often needs to top up its own power supply with electricity from Alberta and other neighbouring jurisdictions. Alberta recently unveiled a bold plan to phase out coal as a source for power production, but it will take at least five years to complete and in the meantime that means at least some of the extra electricity going to B.C. to power any major influx of EVs will come from emissions-intensive coal.
California, which according to IHS Automotive accounts for roughly one half of all the EVs on American roads, may offer an important lesson for dealing with both the grid demand and the emissions problems. Envision Solar International recently won a statewide contract to install so-called “solar chargers” that will allow EVs to be charged without being connected to the grid or generating new emissions.
That is surely not the only way to solve the infrastructure problems created by the impending influx of EVs, but unless governments and utilities of every level begin discussing their own potential solutions soon, those problems could prevail.
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