Jul 21
GM Launches Major Collaboration with EPRI and 30 Utility Companies to Ready the Grid for the Volt
Today at the Plug-in 2008 Conference in San Jose California, GM is announcing a major new collaboration with the Electric Power Institute (EPRI) and 30 major utility companies.
The endeavor is a landmark, first of its kind effort through which GM will work directly with both those utility companies and EPRI to ensure that the codes, standards, and grid capabilities are in place so that when the Chevy Volt comes to market, the infrastructure will be there to support it.
The shift of transportative energy from oil to electricity brings forth a myriad of special needs that automakers and utilities companies have to collaborate on to be sure they are met.
I had the chance to speak with Brita Gross who is GMs’ Manager of Hydrogen and Electrical Infrastructure about the announcement.
She advised me this collaboration is a very big and extremely important initiative. It encompasses three broad areas.
First, work will take place on the technical interface. Here, the utility companies will collaborate with GM to examine how the vehicles will interact with the electric grid. All the issues related to charging will be looked at. Methods to recognize and manage the cars’ draws, impact on peak and off-peak capacity, home and away from home charging, as examples, will be developed. From this, technical standards will be created. The Volt and indeed all future plug-in cars will then have to adhere to these standards. The fact that GM is first to do this gives them a significant strategic advantage as well ensuring the Volt launches well.
The second area of focus will be education for the public. For years the public has had difficulty understanding what conventional hybrids are. Adding a plug to the equation increases the complexity consumers will have to grasp. New learning will have to take place and the utility companies are willing and able to help GM in this educational process.
The third element is the development of policy. By planning together, GM and the utility companies will be able to go before government bodies on a state, federal, and local level as a partnership seeking the same goals. These goals include the development of appropriate incentives at the consumer and corporate level to encourage mass adoption of plug-in vehicles.
Britta advises me that this collaboration involves 30 utility companies stretching into 37 states and 3 Canadian provinces. Most of the major utility companies are represented and as a whole serve a very large volume of the US population. It has a far greater and more powerful scope than simply working with EPRI as other automakers already are.
Full press release below:
General Motors and Electric Utility Industry Launch Major Collaboration to Commercialize Plug-in Vehicles
• Paves way for customers to realize the benefits of plug-in electric vehicles such as the Chevrolet Volt and Saturn Vue Plug-in Hybrid
• Further progress on road to electrification of the automobile
San Jose, CALIF – General Motors announced today that it will collaborate with the nonprofit Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) – more than 30 of the top electric utilities in the United States and Canada — to accelerate the introduction of plug-in electric vehicles.
General Motors will work with EPRI and the utility companies on everything from codes and standards to grid capability to ensure that when the Volt goes to market, the infrastructure is ready – and customers can realize the full potential of these revolutionary vehicles as soon as they leave the showroom.
Details of the alliance, which is by far the largest and most-comprehensive between an automaker and the electric utility industry, were announced today in San Jose during the Plug-In 2008 Conference.
Among the many things the coalition will address include ensuring safe and convenient vehicle charging, raising the public awareness and understanding of plug-in electric vehicles, and working with public policy leaders to enable a transition from petroleum to electricity as a fuel source.
“Together with EPRI and the utility companies, we can transform automotive transportation as we know it, and get our nation and the world past oil dependence – and heading toward a future that is electric,” said Jon Lauckner, GM VP of Global Program Management. “This group is taking significant steps toward making electric vehicles a reality and in helping our customers enjoy the tremendous benefits these vehicles will provide.”
Using electricity to power vehicles such as the Volt and the Vue Plug-in is attractive to GM because it can simultaneously reduce the industry’s dependence on petroleum and vehicle greenhouse gas emissions. Consumers will also see a tremendous benefit as the cost per equivalent mile of a vehicle powered by electricity is roughly one-fifth of the cost per mile when powered by gasoline.
The coalition of utility companies plays a critical role in developing universal technical standards that will facilitate ease of use and commercial feasibility of electric vehicles.
“EPRI is pleased to collaborate with GM and utility leaders in electric transportation to work together in advancing plug-in hybrid electric vehicle transportation,” said Arshad Mansoor, Vice President of EPRI’s Power Delivery & Utilization sector. “This collaboration is critical in the development of standards that will lead to the widespread use of electricity as a transportation fuel.”
Last month, GM, along with EPRI, received a conditional award from the U.S. Department of Energy to create a plug-in demo program using the Saturn Vue.
In June, GM’s Board of Directors committed to production of the Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric vehicle — due in showrooms in late 2010. And, at the 2008 North American International Auto Show, GM announced its intention to produce a plug-in hybrid electric version of the Saturn Vue. Given the huge potential vehicles such as the Chevrolet Volt and Saturn Vue plug-in hybrid offers for fuel economy improvement, these programs have emerged as top priorities at GM.
“This coalition shares a vision of bringing plug in vehicles to market so we can accelerate the use of electricity as a substitute for gasoline,” said Lauckner. “We are focused on creating affordable, highly desired vehicles that will take advantage of the grid – and providing accessible, reliable, convenient low cost electricity to plug-in customers. Collectively, we can realize all of the benefits of the plug-in revolution.”
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This entry was posted on Monday, July 21st, 2008 at 11:01 pm and is filed under Grid. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
Jul 21st, 2008 (11:08 pm)GM is taking the lead with the Volt – all others will follow their standards.
Jul 21st, 2008 (11:22 pm)This is excellent news, very encouraging. The leader dictates the pace…lets hope that GM continues on this path.
Jul 21st, 2008 (11:40 pm)Martin Eberhard got his Tesla a couple of days ago. He has shown GM and the rest of the auto world the way ahead.
http://teslafounders.wordpress.com/
Jul 21st, 2008 (11:46 pm)Sounds like good news. I just hope GM doesn’t bias any standards to favor “range extended” plug-in EV’s over pure battery EV’s.
I think there is also some implied good news in here too… that GM plans to be building lots more than just a couple hundred thousand plug-ins… ie. they plan to be building enough to actually mean power companies need to be involved.
Sadly one thing still bothers me is “Brita Gross who is GMs’ Manager of Hydrogen and Electrical Infrastructure”…. the emphasis still seems to be Hydrogen
Jul 21st, 2008 (11:53 pm)well they just might be planning on mass producing the electric vehicles after all .. this does show some effort making sure the infrastructure is there
Jul 21st, 2008 (11:54 pm)So, where’s my Volt?
Jul 21st, 2008 (11:57 pm)#3 Demetius
Yes, at Tesla’s breakneck speed they might have their entire directory of employees supplied with Roadsters by the end of the next decade.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:00 am)Looks like GM is serious this time about electric vehicles if they have gone as far as they have, with discussing with 30 utility companies.
But, will they continue to be serious?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:09 am)It’s my true hope that as a nation, we can all support each of these companies that now have finally taken a different direction that will benefit this country beyond profit. Competition is good, but I think it has come at the expense of too many. General Motors, Tesla, Fisker, and all the other companies investing in this new direction will truly change our Nation. I applaud GM’s bold roll in partnering with EPRI to set up better standards.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:19 am)Wow!
Hey GM…after this how about world domination?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:24 am)Build a decent grid & they will come.
Did I mention it is way cheaper than H2.
http://www.aep.com/about/transmission/docs/Whatis20percent.pdf
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:35 am)maybe gm does realize a utility company is better partner then a oil company the power will be there for centurys to come its not prone to wars or over pricing due to buying electricity up lol/ ( oil speculators) u dont have to send peope to war for it dont even need special interest groups for this … its a very simple relaible way to power ur vehincles start partnerships that will last and be benificial in every way possible.. lol
brsides oil will dry up in a few decades.. maybe they are wise enough to see to switch early
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:32 am)This is good news, IMO.
Automakers have huge impact on policy and if GM is leading the bull by the horns!
The rest of the dominoes will soon start to fall.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:34 am)Yes the Utilities need to invest in infrastructure and the barriers to building the infrastructure (the NIMBY’s) need to be overcome. Can we build wind farms where the rich and powerful can see them? Nope. Why no nuclear plants in 30 years? NIMBY’s rule by lawsuit.
Can we invest in Lithium Ion Car battery production facilities in the USA? Or would that effort grind to a halt under the twin barriers of regulatory burden and NIMBY lawsuits?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:45 am)On a side note, I think much of the “infrastructure” would include another meter to monitor how much electricity is used for the cars and then tax that meter for the same $0.38 +/- per gallon ($0.064 per kwh) for highway maintenance.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:17 am)RE #15 Jes
“On a side note, I think much of the “infrastructure” would include another meter to monitor how much electricity is used for the cars and then tax that meter for the same $0.38 +/- per gallon ($0.064 per kwh) for highway maintenance.”
yes, quite probably. However, it is not necessarily in GM’s or utilities’ interests to become unpaid tax collectors, so they may not build that in unless Uncle Sam mandates it. Uncle Sam usually has his eye off the ball enough that I would be surprised to see this in v1.0. But by the time v2.0 or v3.0 comes along it may be a different matter. Also if the tax meter is on the utility side, then off-grid capable solar installations or other co-generation systems may have an advantage.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:48 am)This is excellent news! I was hoping GM would see that they have the opportunity to grab new markets in the electrification of the automobile. From the actual cars, IP, to smart grid infrastructure. This is going to be a lot bigger than the Internet market. They say energy is a $4 Trillion market. I have hope that GM sees this light and follows it. This could be a company turnaround that will be used in business school case studies for centuries to come. Keep the foot on the pedal GM! It is me or is GM acting like Google all of a sudden? This is exciting.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:35 am)jes I don’t think they are going to bother with a special meter. Probably will either A: tax ALL electricity at a lower rate than for vehicle specific charging (which would be prone to cheating) or B: incorporate the current gasoline tax into income tax because long term people might be generating a significant portion of their electricity at the house. Lots of companies promise cheap solor in 2009 or 2010.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:40 am)#15 jes – Agreed, but how would gov’t know the difference between electric used for your dryer and for your Volt? Would Volt owners pay the same tax surcharge as pure BEV owners?
“If it doesn’t move, subsidize it. If it moves, tax it. If it stops moving, appoint a blue ribbon panel to study it until it moves again.”
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Now, would someone please tell me why we need a 140 horsepower car engine just to turn the Volt’s generator? Point of reference – a 10 horsepower Honda engine on a portable generator does a fine job of producing power. Why the need for SO many horsepower?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:21 am)One other thought on the tax is that the gov’t might just concider it a “tax break” for those who decide to get off of oil. After all, its an e-rev, not a pure EV, therefor, they will be geting their tax income anyways.
Scratch my #15 comment.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:56 am)For now, let’s increase the tax on gas,….(2 times)….and drop the tax on diesel …..now our goods can move at a less costly rate….THEN steadily increase the gas tax and put it toward alternative energy….Germany has been doing this for years and it’s working!!!!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:05 am)The need to look at VTG and using the Volt as a Grid Storage Buffer as well all programmed through the Car’s onboard Wireless IP connection. A nice display of how much the car had earned you by leasing the battery when you were on holiday would be welcome.
Finally there are really huge, potentially life saving benefits for using the Volt as a stand-by generator for a house during a sustained power cut. All these things need to be being discussed and standardised now.
Go Volt! Go GM! Go USA!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:27 am)Impressive news… GM seems to really be looking ahead!!!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:50 am)Article says, The second area of focus will be education for the public. For years the public has had difficulty understanding what conventional hybrids are. Adding a plug to the equation increases the complexity consumers will have to grasp. New learning will have to take place and the utility companies are willing and able to help GM in this educational process.
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Education: Here is a plug. A male plug. Here is the socket. A female socket. Insert male plug into female socket. Done.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:06 am)#24 Rashiid
Good one Rashiid……
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:27 am)It is nice that GM and the US Power Companies are doing a little more. They now are about 2 years behind their Japanese counterparts in this kind of collaboration. They likely are getting started now because of some federal grant or need for federal approval of something. It doesn’t matter insofar as US PR value. Insofar as technical standards, though, maybe they will be wise enough just to copy what is being done already in Japan.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:33 am)It is almost comical how GM and the power companies, neither group seen as leading lights on technical matters, are going to focus on “educating the public.” The poor, dumb public (as they see us) is far ahead of either GM or the power companies in seeing the need and wishing to have electrically powered cars. The whole process is being held up by the failure to deliver any significant number of cars. Despite all this big talk about Hydrogen, GM still has no cost-competitive plan for hydrogen cars, no battery contract (so far as we know) for electric cars, and no real plans for substantial numbers of either one.
Rather than putting down the rest of us, they need to get to work (or get back to work) and build some.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:35 am)Besides V2G, road use taxes, and other items that will probably be long term considerations, I believe GM is working with EPRI and the utilities to find mechanisms to encourage the use of plug-ins.
Some posters have access to off-peak rates from their local utility, while some utilities don’t offer such rates. With the mass adoption of electric vehicles, the load profile for the grid will see a significant and hopefully beneficial change. See the attached link for the California ISO:
http://www.caiso.com/
As we can see from the demand curve, power draw is only a nominal 23,000 MW in the early am hours, and will peak today near 38,000 MW. With the adoption of plug-ins, and the use of proper incentives by the utilities, this curve could be much flatter, so that power plants can operate more continuously at more efficient load points.
I believe GM will lobby for utilities to provide low-cost night time charging. This will enable the utility to have a more efficient system, and also sell more power. It also provides lower rates for the plug-in users.
Without some night time incentives, many people will just plug in their vehicles at any time (such as after a day’s commute, plug in during peak time at 5:30 pm). This will serve to increase peak loading, rather than even out the system load.
Although I’m sure there are many things that need to be discussed, I believe this may be the primary focus at this time.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:38 am)I know every single one of us has seen “Who Killed the Electric Car” but do you know (and my fellow Texans will back me up on this) not one single theater played the movie in the Dallas area and only a select few aired “An Inconvenient Truth” for a very limited time. Conversely, in Oregon (where I live now), every theater showed both of those movies and a few still air them now at the dollar theaters. Even the DVDs are very limited in Dallas and I had to ask some stores to even find it and the sales people had to look it up cuz they have not heard of the movie.
The culture from place to place varies greatly and I will admit, that I was one who was misinformed on many aspects of electric cars until I watched the movie. Electric cars (and hybrids for that matter) are just not as accepted or commonplace in places like Dallas as they are in places like Portland. There is a HUGE need to educate the public. Dallas my be a bad example because they are not on EPRI, but I think you catch my drift.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:38 am)This is something our lazy government should get involved with, but they only will if forced into it.
Thanks GM for taking the initiative! In the end it will be really be beneficial for GM and it’s image.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:45 am)The lead news (Krisher, AP story) from yesterday at the Plug-In 2008 conference concerns Li-ion batteries, seen by speakers as performing much better, still in need of development insofar as cooling, and still too expensive ($10K per car) to allow cost competitive cars.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:58 am)Now this was a really long thread post (new record?), so maybe I missed what exactly this ‘collaboration’ is going to achieve. I think people understand, “plug in your car” just fine.
This is what I take from the article:
“By planning together, GM and the utility companies will be able to GO BEFORE GOVERNMENT bodies on a state, federal, and local level as a partnership seeking the same goals. These goals include the development of appropriate incentives at the consumer and CORPORATE LEVEL to encourage mass adoption of plug-in vehicles.”
Sounds like GM/ultilities going for the cash grab again to me. Unless we just had the longest post ever that says, “We are going to teach the public that if you have a plug-in car…you can plug it in…and it’s cheaper than gas”
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:03 am)I think you guys are missing the point all together.
If you were to go to the mall and ask people at random, would you concider buying a $30K compact car made by GM, but you have to plug it in, would you? Unless they follow this stuff like us, most will say no becase they think electric cars are too weak, to limited range, to compact, to ugly, to inconvinient to plug in, etc. and the Volt is far from a luxury car.
At the corporate level, changing fleets to electric vehicles is not what they will be preaching….it’s that it is finacially feasable.
Also at the corporate level, it is to allow more buisness to let you plug in at work.
Also, it’s to help convince apartments to have charging available to tenants.
THERE IS A VERY BIG NEED TO EDUCATE THE PUBLIC!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:09 am)Hey..wasnt their some connection of the lack of electrical power in california and enron??
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:19 am)#24
One small education item may be the gauge and length of the cable for the plug. One of the reasons for the non-standard plug on the concept vehicle is probably to ensure the appropriate sizes are used for the electrical cable.
I think existing electrical standards with any needed education on cable sizing should be used for the plug. Yes, the Volt concept’s plug portrays the appearance of “greater attention to detail”. However, I believe that it will be considered a negative on the Volt (no pun intended). Owners should be able to purchase the plug at any local hardware store.
If needed, just add a label like the “Unleaded Gas Only”. Something like…”X gauge minimum, Y ft maximum cable, Z amps”. The amps label would remind the owner that the Volt does not have a small cell phone battery. In other words, multiple devices on the same circuit could trip the breaker.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:22 am)Or the Li ion battery….
Even thoughs who knows a lot about batteries, but have not kept up with the A123 and LG improvments will still be under the impression that the battery will not last more than 3 years and / or shorten the lifespan in hot climates.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:25 am)29 Jes:
No offense but if you rely on your education in both matters on the information in those “Documentaries” then you are being taught wrong information.
Statik:
You would be surprised. People don’t understand serial hybrids. You have to combat range anxiety and technophobia. Handle it wrong and the technology becomes like modern nuclear plants, feared and misunderstood by the American public. Handle it correctly and 25 years from now the gas engine will be an anachronism and people will wonder why we drove such loud vehicles to begin with.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:29 am)#37 Morgan
FYI…no I don’t rely my info on documentaries (I’m a renewable energy engineering major), but in order to get the masses to understand something they have no interest in (energy and energy effeciency) you have to be able to present it to them in a manor that they walk away saying they learned something…and those are two documenteries that have impact.
And also, FYI, for you, I know they are made with a tone for the authors and they try to gear all the facts to their argument, but if you believe all the info is wrong, boy….you sure do need some public education.
Totally agree with the 2nd half of your post.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:41 am)I for one find this to be a good thing. Reason? Why would GM be in talks with the grid-owners unless they planned to make enough plug-ins to actually have it be an issue? I know we’ve heard a lot about ‘niche’ and ‘low volume’ but either one does not justify the expense and trouble of the actions taken here. We’re looking at a setup for a LOT of cars in a rather short timeframe.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:47 am)38 Jes:
Probably had a lot of the same classes as you are currently taking, including Environmental Management
That still doesn’t stop me from believing carbon offsets are bunk and a Ponzi scheme.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:51 am)The EDUCATION angle
to me seems to be for people to not overload the grid (think roilling blackouts when everyone kicks onthe A/C) add electric vehicvle charge and power management on the existing (ancient) grid is going to be neccessary.
If the neighborhood transformer handles X kw of power, sized for the average home at max draw with AC on, then everyone in the neighbrhood gets a plug in EV, the demand changes, the grid will need to adapt, and that will take time.
Simnple things like charging timers that kill the AC at night so as to not over load the system until “fuel” distribution is addressed by the utilities.
GM is smart to involve them, initially 50,000 volts all over the country will not be a huge dent, allowing the utilities time, but as the number of EV start piping up the demand will grow REAL fast.
The utilities need to be on board, and consummer education is a MUST, or the EV market will be tattered by “don’t buy electrics vehicles, the grid can’t support them.” It can, but it must be managed and that is where the education must be.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:55 am)jes — We on this blog are the public, too. Right now there are fewer GM electric cars than there are people on this blog (even this thread of this blog). Right now we can give credit to people who know nothing about electric cars as not having spent the time we have working on a topic that as yet has no productive value
That is, when there are cars for sale at dealerships, or at the least when there is a definite schedule and price for when cars will be available, there will be concrete benefits to be gained from “educating” a wider group. Right now the “educated” group (if you want to call us that) is so much larger than the number of cars available (which is zero) that there is nothing to be gained by missionary work.
All of us welcome anyone who would like to know what we do about this subject, but for the moment electric cars like the Volt are just an interest or a hobby. Until there are real cars, the subject is just a speculative fantasy about the future, not something that everyone needs to know about. I hope that changes, but it has not changed yet.
No one foresees a sudden flood of millions of battery-powered cars, Volts or otherwise, so there will be plenty of time, based on actual experience with real cars.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:59 am)#32
You are probably closer to the truth.
“We are going to teach the public that if you have a plug-in car…you can plug it in…and it’s cheaper than gas”
This could be a good message…but first, it is only true with higher oil prices. Yes, electrical energy costs less than gas, but not if vehicle cost is included. Second, the message needs to be communicated that the “electrical auto industry” will be supported to the same level as the “oil auto industry” for the long term. It is just talk until a little history is generated. I would guess most people think the Volt is just another EV1…”California Dreams”. If GM is serious about mass production, this myth needs to be dispelled.
Should the government put tighter controls on the auto industry to promote plug in vehicles? Like tax breaks for plug ins and more tax on gasoline.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:01 am)#39 Grant
GM and the utilities may not be thinking about the public in the sense of individual people. Rather, they often are thinking about public money, e.g. federal grants and tax credits.
As Statik sweetly pointed out above
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:03 am)Static
>> “By planning together, GM and the utility companies will be able to GO BEFORE GOVERNMENT bodies on a state, federal, and local level as a partnership seeking the same goals. These goals include the development of appropriate incentives at the consumer and CORPORATE LEVEL to encourage mass adoption of plug-in vehicles.”
Sounds like GM/ultilities going for the cash grab again to me.
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Funny how different people hear the same thing and take away different messages. I heard GM taking the lead by establishing a variety of standards with regard to the interface between electric vehicles and electric utilities. I’d much rather have the entities that are directly affected by this interface determine these standards than a buch of federal and state beaurocrats. Having been a Beltway Bandit for the better part of 20 years I know from personal experiece how staggeringly inept and just flat out wrong the “standards” developed by beaurocrats can be.
The establishment of interface standards is a major step in the development and dissemination of any new technological paradigm. It’s not sexy and the only time you’ll see it in the press is when its been done wrong and the media is looking for a scapegoat. One of the reasons beaurocracies botch standards is because the beaurocrats creating the standards have no real vested interest in the outcome of the standards… they get a paycheck no matter what the result. Good standards are developed by entities with long-term vested interests in the standards.
The way popular media has demonized large corporate interests, I understand how you could take your somewhat paranoid position. The impression I get from this partnership is that it is an outstanding act of LEADERSHIP.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:07 am)#45 ThomC
Why exactly do we need a standard for plugging in a car? You take the cord, you plug it in. What else? I am not being sarcastic here, I’d really like to know what the goal is.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:25 am)#34 THOM
There was some shady dealings going on. Do an internet search on “California electricity crisis,” ot go to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_electricity_crisis
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:26 am)#40 Morgan
I guess we will respectfully disagree. When I watched An Inconvenient Truth, it was like Gore had been saying everything I have been preacing since 2001. So if you disagree, then we will respectfully disagree and get back on topic.
#41 Mitch
Totally agree that has a large part of it; good point. Maybe that is why GM wants to limit the first cars to 8kWh of charging instead of a full blown EV.
#42 RB
I see your point, but I’m sure GM and the electric companies want to have a more informed public before releasing the product.
#46 RB
I like the standard plug options for optimal charging and so that apartments and workplaces can have car charging ports without someone tapping into the line to power their house/apt onto someone elses account. I’m sure someone can invent an adapter, but it would be more hassel and some deterant.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:28 am)#34 THOM
From Wikipedia;
“The California electricity crisis (also known as the Western Energy Crisis) of 2000 and 2001 resulted from the gaming of a partially deregulated California energy system by energy companies such as Enron and Reliant Energy.”
Search “California electricity crisis.”
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:28 am)On the issue of taxing the electricity: what if the CAR sent the information to the tax collectors?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:30 am)Well I am just happy to see the ball rolling again. Back in th 70s we had a good start then the price of oil fell and we could not give away the alternative energy projects. We shall see what happens this time.
My brother sent me an email this morning saying he filled up his truck last night for $3.85. Down from $4.15 the day before. He lives in Mid state IL.
Take Care
Arch
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:40 am)Standards are long overdue.
Remember the large paddle, small paddle, AVCON charging station mess that lack of standards caused for electric charging a few years ago.
Will the new standards handle the 70 Amp / 240 V charging used by Tesla Motors?
Will utilities pay electric car owners for making their car batteries available for utility needs (Vehicle to Grid)? Will GM void battery warranties of owners who participate?
Will Big Brother issues pop up if vehicles provide their ID numbers when charging? Will Government use the IDs to tax vehicles for their power use?
Many important issues are involved. Undoubtedly many “Enhancements” to whatever standards are made will be needed to handle them.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (9:04 am)Building an infrastructure to recover the loss in tax revenue because of reduction in gasoline usage is an interesting topic. If we manage to shift to domestic energy from the plug for two thirds of our miles driven, then we will need to adjust our revenue stream to support road infrastructure.
Lets say the average person uses 60 gallons of gas per month and therefore pays about $15 per month in road taxes. So money could be recovered by increasing the DMV license fee by $200. That way people who do not shift to electric would in effect pay double the road tax. Sounds like a plan
Jul 22nd, 2008 (9:08 am)It scares me when intelligent people are actually Wanting the gov’t to get more involved in using it’s tax mechanisms to bamboozle the public by giving what they shouldn’t have taken to begin with. Does the gov’t have a winning record in meddling? Rarely. Does industry? Usually. So lets keep the new electricity tax schemes O-U-T.
Wouldn’t it be nice if you purchased electricity off the grid like a commodity market. It takes an advanced meter. The price is constantly fluctuating based on supply and demand. If a mechanism like this were used I could sell my Volt electricity next time Enron tries to monkey with prices and drive them sky high. Electrical fill-up stations prices would vary based on the current demand, encouraging people to “fill-up” at optimum times. This would help level out the grid demand tremendously, eliminating the costly peaks and troughs that are designed for making it much more efficient.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (9:17 am)#24 “Here is a plug. A male plug. Here is the socket. A female socket. Insert male plug into female socket. Done.”
and if the polarity is incorrect onthe 115volt connection? I work with electronics and proper polarity is often crucial. most homes have improper polarity.
#27 “The poor, dumb public (as they see us) is far ahead of either GM or the power companies in seeing the need and wishing to have electrically powered cars.”
What the hell does this have to do with making sure the infrastucture is ready for electric cars? this “colaboration” is about setting standards, and ensuring infrastructure can supply..google overloaded grid, and see how our appetite is outstripping our supply, or how old the grid is, how much is required to fix it…it has NOTHING to do with seeing the need for and wishing for electric cars..
#32 ” I think people understand, “plug in your car” just fine”
see upper comment. Also…”Sounds like GM/ultilities going for the cash grab again to me” it could also be to improve the infrastructure to support the EV, but that was my first impression..
Jul 22nd, 2008 (9:35 am)#48
OK…and the difference is….getting screwed by enron not exxon!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (9:50 am)Won’t it be WONDERFUL in 2020 or whenever, when we won’t have to worry about some “stuff” happening in the Middle East or some other oil producing country? It seems like every time some rogue group in Nigeria or Iraq even THINKS of attacking an oilfield or a pipeline the price of a barrel of oil gets jacked up $10-20 dollars. Us drivers have to pay for this nonsense.
In 2025, we might not CARE if Israel attacks Iran because they are trying to build nukes. Maybe in 25 years, Iran could block the Straits of Hormuz and the oil traders would yawn … not that big of a deal. No more ridiculous military spending in the Middle East just to keep the oil flowing.
Why? Because America and the rest of the world can get all the energy for their cars they want from their local electricity plant 20 or so miles away. Like in the movie classic “Blazing Saddles” … we won’t NEED no steaanking oil! Not from the Middle East sheiks or Hugo Chavez or any oil baron who wants to rip off us drivers over in order to get rich.
The oil industry will have to focus on selling oil for plastics or something … while everyone is driving their cars and trucks using fairly inexpensive electricity … all they want. Hopefully, we’re going to be getting all that electricity from solar in the future. Or fusion energy or something. Fusion doesn’t have the safety, waste or nuclear proliferation problems that fission does. They just need to figure out how to make it work and do it fairly inexpensively.
Hopefully, the scientists will master the technology for superconducting electric transmission lines and they’ll be able to send electricity over long distances via a smart grid will almost no losses … inexpensively. People in Maine might could get electricity that came from the deserts of Arizona for the same price as a coal fired plant. Someday, those monster SUVs might even make a comeback … only they’ll be running on electrons instead of guzzling gasoline. I know this all sounds far fetched, but with the rate that technology is advancing in this global economy it might happen sooner than we think. Never know. Science fiction has a tendency to become science fact.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:02 am)GM is doing just exactly what they need to be doing in setting up the infrastructure for working with the electric companies to insure the successful adoption of electric vehicles. This is a necessary early step. Education of the “masses” is an equally important goal and involves many facets. It is not as simple as “here is a plug and you plug it in”.
Working with the electrical industry, GM can design the Volt to charge itself at the most opportune times when energy cost is lower. Many important topics must be settled even down to how the electric vehicle will communicate with the charging station at home or at the mall. Design of the charging station in shopping malls, at work or where ever is another topic for collaboration.
I will trust GM and the electric industry to make the necessary designs rather than trust the government. If you leave it to the government, every state will differ and even within the states you may have differences. This is a national “problem” and it demand a national solution. This can be done as GM is approaching it or we can leave it up to our government to do it. Which do you prefer?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:10 am)You may very well be resigned to the fact that government will find a way to recover lost tax revenues. It may not do so immediately, but when a significant tax portion is lost, they will act. I don’t even like to think about the ways the government may try to tax us. It hurts my head to even start. There are so many ways and none of them is good. They may try to tax your electrical use, but that would drive more of us into installing our on power generation equipment. They may try taxing the vehicle through the state when pay your annual tag renewal fees. Not all states pay annual tag renewal fees.
One thing we can be assure of – some bureaucrat will find a method because there is one thing the government is really good at and that is finding revenue sources. (The best thing they are good at is wasting our money.)
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:15 am)You guys are not going to believe this, but every day I plug in my toaster, and every day it works fine, and then I unplug it, all by myself, using existing technology and safety standards
All my neighbors are getting up about the same time, and many of them are using their toasters too, and so far we’ve not shut down the grid even once 
From what we’ve heard so far, the Volt takes the same voltage and about the same current as the toaster. If in some decades there should be as many Volts as toasters, it may be that the utility has to take that into account, and if so I’m sure they will. In the interim, I doubt it, as I don’t think either toasters or Volts have nearly the power draw of heat pumps, which are present in most all the houses in our town.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:24 am)Another article on this same subject.
http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080722/AUTO01/807220364
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:35 am)#58..your right..I don’t believe it..lol
but alternatively, I do not think your toaster is as complicated as a volt, and it has been designed to a STANDARD (think CSA / ULC) to which the utilities has input.
no one thinks that connecting the plug is tough, but how about if someone does not have it on a dedicated circuit? or polarity for the electronics? or should the plug be a dedicated HARD wired connection, does the electrical code need an amendment to adapt to the EV market.
Some appliances require a special plug so nothing else can use it..should this be the case for EV’s? (think welders, dryers and ranges..)
I work in a manufacturing sector, where the design standard for the stuff we build takes 8 2″ binders covering all possible parameters that we may need to meet depending onthe product we are building. Some are not applicable, and that is the design standard, then there are installation codes that need to be addressed, which have a national, state / provincial and local amendments.
this is not about teaching people to use a plug…
Mitch
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:36 am)Somewhat off topic, but I wonder how all this will affect taxes. After all, with the high price of gas, there’s a lot of tax revenue associated with gasoline sales. When we all start using EVs, that means there will be less tax revenue for the cities, states, etc.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:36 am)@ Dick #21:
One small problem with dropping the diesel tax – more and more, that’s the tax that goes to fix roads, while the tax on regular gas tends to be diverted to social programs or balancing the budget. Think our roads are bad now? One truck loaded to 18 tons (about half the typical legal load) does the same amount of damage to a road as 1,000 cars, due to the weight. Now if we encourage more truck traffic with cheaper diesel, rather that looking at more rail transport, things will get much worse fairly quickly! I agree with the principle you’re advocating (cheaper transport = cheap goods = better economy), just not this method of implementation.
@ Van #52: Excellent idea! Only problem I see is that it would have to be phased in slowly, or those without electric propulsion will revolt.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:45 am)#58 RB
It is a big deal, you only plug your toaster in for a few minutes each day, but you’ll plug your volt in for 8 hours each day, not to mention the volt should draw more amps for quicker charge times. Anyways, as more electric cars get on the road there IS a problem that arises. Every electric car means that so many gallons of gas worth of energy more has to be produced by the utilties. If we had enough to take us off foriegn oil, then all the energy from all those barrels of oil needs to be produced from by utilities, mind you it is more efficient, so it doesnt require as MUCH fuel (and mostly coal, not oil)
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:07 am)There is an easy way to shift the roadway maintenance revenue away from oil as more electrics hit the road. Roads don’t care about how much gas and electricity you car uses; what more affects them is the number of vehicle miles driven on them. So here’s the solution. Tax people on an annual miles-driven basis. Every state in the US records mileage when your car has to pass its regular inspection, and the inspection station could then pass on the information to the appropriate government agency. The tax rate per mile that you pay would be proportional to the weight of your vehicle, since vehicle weight also has a direct wear-and-tear effect on roadways.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:13 am)Oh man, does the general public ever need to be educated!! Example: A few years ago in PA I saw a girl in her early 20s walking around her car in circles at an interstate gas station. She was from Jersey, where gas stations were full serve, and she had no idea how to pump her own gas. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I actually had to help her. Folks, there are some duuuumb people in this great country of ours. If we want electrics to dominate the market, we need to educate people on the fundamental basics of the technology.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:16 am)The state of Oregon has done some useful work on the matter of what should replace the gasoline tax as gasoline sales decline.
I have not read it completely but Google “Road User Fee Task Force” and read their “Final Report”.
They did a pilot program where basically a GPS system logged miles traveled. The tax for vehicle miles traveled was paid each time you went to the gas station. For total electric vehicles, they suggest adding the tax onto a smart-metered home eletricity meter.
They say “The 2001 Oregon Legislature established the Road User Fee Task Force “to develop a design for revenue collection for Oregon’s roads and highways that will replace the current system for revenue collection.” After considering 28 different funding ideas, the task force recommended that the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) conduct a pilot program to study two strategies called The Oregon Mileage Fee Concept: (1) the feasibility of replacing the gas tax with a mileage based fee collected at fueling stations and (2) the feasibility of using this system to collect congestion charges. ODOT launched a 12-month pilot program in April of 2006 designed to test the technological and administrative feasibility of this concept. The program included 285 volunteer vehicles, with 299 motorists, and two service stations in Portland.”
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:39 am)I think GM and the electric utility companies ought to get a big keiretsu going like the Japanese have been doing for the past 50 years … an America, Inc. electric car keiretsu. We need to be able to compete vigorously against Japan, Inc. Japan clearly knows how to make pretty good cars. Japan is very good at electronics too. If America doesn’t get ready to ride this big electric car wave that’s coming, the Japanese and European companies surely will.
We need several industries to do their part to make the electrification of the automobile a big success. Semiconductor companies could play a big part. I see a bunch of IT related products going into the E-Flex cars … maybe a few HUGE nanotech innovations like nanoparticle electrodes or nanowire batteries, etc. Same thing with the software industry. Lots of lines of computer code will need to be written for all these control systems for the cars. Maybe thin film solar panels on the car and truck roofs will get practical. You could put some good sized solar panels on the top of all those 18 wheelers you know. LOTS of possibilities.
These big companies are all going to have a huge stake in the success of plug-ins and all electric cars. They ought to all help each other out in any way possible. If GM needs a cash infusion to accelerate research and development for some badly needed technology for the E-Flex cars, then maybe the utilities and other big companies can help them out financially, technically or both. I hear that GE is doing this already with A123. We need a lot of that. Lots of private and public collaboration.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:39 am)I am part of a campaign aimed at General Motors to become Green Motors and become a hybrid/electric car manufacturer. Check it out here: http://www.thepoint.com/campaigns/save-general-motors-and-the-planet-at-the-same-time
General Motors is falling apart, losing billions, and in jeopardy of going out of business. If we can convince them that there is a viable market for them taking drastic action to convert their cars and trucks to being the most environmentally efficient in the world, they have nothing to lose by unconditionally embracing the green movement.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:43 am)This is one of the more encouraging reports I have seen here lately. All credit to GM and the utilities for approaching this in such a professional way.
If GM and the utilities join forces to lobby for more incentives to popularize electric vehicles, I say so much the better. I said a long time ago that, if the US government can offer $3500 incentives to people to buy Toyota Priuses, it can by God offer $10,000 incentives for Volts. They are a huge jump ahead in technology, oil independence, national security, and will by made in USA by US workers. What’s the problem?
If people can circumvent the gas tax for the first few years by going electric, so much the better as well. One more incentive to get off oil. Take the road maintenance money out of the defense budget, as we will have to fight less wars for oil.
I totally agree with #62 Jeffrey on the diesel tax. Trucks beat the roads to death. They should pay for the maintenance that their operations create, not externalize it onto the public.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:48 am)#67 GM Volt Fan:
Amen!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:52 am)So it begins…. the energy age!
The future is going to be good. With this kind of foresight from GM, it is quite clear the direction we are going. Much less oil in our future and this is great news. The space age and technology age have led us right into the energy age with GM leading the charge! PHEV’s are just the start we need.
Go GM Go…
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:57 am)Jes #33 says,
I think you guys are missing the point all together.
If you were to go to the mall and ask people at random, would you concider buying a $30K compact car made by GM, but you have to plug it in, would you?
————–
You have to get past the first part of your question, before you can get to the second part.
“Would you consider buying a $30K compact car made by GM?”
66 percent would say no. Use the exact same question substituting Toyota for GM, and I would bet the answer would be different.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:59 am)Carbon Offsets are not a Ponzi scheme. Rather, they are a green indulgence.
An indulgence is an absolution you purchase before you sin.
A Ponzi scheme is a confidence game where you pay high returns on the first round of investments (directly from the funds invested) in order to induce a second, larger round of investment. Once you have collected the money from the second group of investors you depart for a country that has no extradition treaty with the USA.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:02 pm)Rashiid,
What if you asked,
Would you pay $30k for a car that will get you off oil, help the economy and be better for the environment?
I think alot of yes would happen.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:04 pm)THOM @ 55,
You wrote, “Better to be screwed by Enron…”
I think it is better because we’re not importing oil from the Middle East. Moreover, electricity is fungible, meaning you can create it from many different sources; even sources from your own home. Solar, wind, hydro, nuclear, etc. GET ME OFF OF MY ADDICTION TO OIL FIRST, THEN WE’LL TALK ABOUT ALTERNATIVES.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:05 pm)74. Jim Rowland.
Yes. I think most people would say yes to that question.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:05 pm)After reading about all the regulations and specifications involved, it seems to me that the Prius and Prius-like cars are the way to go, rather than the Volt or anything automotive that is plugged in. Plugging in is too complicated, not from a technical viewpoint, but because of legal and regulatory considerations.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:05 pm)#53 Cautious Fan
“It scares me when intelligent people are actually Wanting the gov’t to get more involved in using it’s tax mechanisms to bamboozle the public by giving what they shouldn’t have taken to begin with.”
I take it you’ll be driving your nice new Volt up and down your driveway since you won’t have a road to drive it on. You want roads? Well there isn’t a “road fairy” so we need to pay for them.
“Wouldn’t it be nice if you purchased electricity off the grid like a commodity market. It takes an advanced meter.”
From what we’ve seen so far apparently not. Electric deregulation was a complete disaster in California and it’s not doing much better in Texas. I’m a big fan of deregulation but, for reasons beyond the scope of what we can deal with here, electrical generation may be the exception that proves the rule.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:06 pm)On Standards
Yes, there are standards for 110v and 220v outlets and plugs. Those plugs are not really designed to be plugged and unplugged every day for four to eight years. Usually the reason you have to replace your hair dryer or your toaster is that the cord has frayed.
I think a nice set of idiot-resistant standards is just what the trial lawyers do *not* want.
They should get Underwriters Laboratories involved, too.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:10 pm)Don C # 78 says,
Electric deregulation was a complete disaster in California and it’s not doing much better in Texas.
——
Yup. A disaster in Connecticut also.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:13 pm)The utilities likely pushed for this effort since, with off-peak charging, they will increase their revenues ($200+ /yr./Volt) with little investment in their infrastructure. However, the utilities want more.
The utilities see additional benefits in a V2G scenario, despite the anticipated investment, beyond time-of-use metering, for equipment, communications and software. With V2G, the EV would be connected to the grid for the 23 or so hours per day that it is parked. The utilities would want discretionary 24/7 charging and discharging capability since it would allow the utilities to dynamically send/take power to/from the customer as the grid power capability fluctuates between surplus and deficit. This would decrease the need to maintain a spinning reserve and maximize power utility revenues.
Other potential benefits for the utilities are:
o The ability to collect road taxes, with a fee from the government
o The use of the communications link to the customer can be expanded to include demand management and detection of grow operations and other non-utility applications.
o EV development will spur large-format battery advances that could be used for power system applications. For example, a needed upgrade of an overloaded power distribution line could be deferred by placing batteries at the end of the distribution line.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:19 pm)This is a great step in the right direction.
It still does not release our need on an unrenewable natural resource which will be coal. The oil need will be reduced but coal will still be needed to produce the electricity to charge the cars. Where do we get it? Solar powered hybrids should be next with electric backup. But how do you pay “the man” for solar energy? This will be the biggest reason we will not see solar powered cars. It leaves out too many open hands.
Or even better use a magnetic “road rail” system for cars that is constantly moving. Like in the movies. Everybody still has their own cars. Onstar can be used to track mileage so individuals can pay for usage and wieght can trigger movement..so kids on their scooter can’t run away.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:24 pm)Yes, this is very good news for GM’s and our future.
Until now, all I’ve read on the subject was coming from California. Their utilities are working with Toyota and Ford, and it seemed that GM had missed the ball.
Some of you may have read about the PG&E demo with a Prius going V2G (vehicle to grid).
http://blogs.business2.com/greenwombat/2007/04/plugin_hybrid_c.html
Now, it seems, GM isn’t just getting in the game. They are helping to write the rule book.
Way to go, guys! Keep it up!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:26 pm)GM’s vice president of global program management, Jon Lauckner, in an interview yesterday said, “To make the Volt and the plug-in Vue succeed is going to take some work.” One big advantage to electric power is cost. Lauckner said the estimated cost per mile with electric power is 1 cent per mile in off-peak periods and 2 cents at peak periods, versus about 14 cents per mile at gasoline prices of more than $4 a gallon. “It’s simple economics,” Lauckner said.
Although we haven’t yet talked about it here, there are at least two things that MUST be addressed to assure optimum grid loading & minimal cost of charging a Volt or a Vue: 1) The charger circuits MUST include a timer that’s driver settable & overridable but that defaults (after, say, 8 hrs) to a charge period of 11PM-5AM, local time; 2) this charge period must be coordinated with the EPRI and local power companies to determine whether the off-peak rate is available only at 240V and whether demand metering is required.
Otherwise, Volt & Vue owners could be paying TWICE as much to charge the battery as should be the case.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:31 pm)Mitch #60.
I don’t know how much we need to worry about that.
I believe the Volt will take a standard 110, which works fine in the US and Canada.
OK. I will concede that it might need a dedicated circuit like the washing machine does, but I don’t think that is a real big deal.
Did I miss something? Thanks.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:43 pm)#84 nasaman wrote:
1) The charger circuits MUST include a timer that’s driver settable & overridable but that defaults (after, say, 8 hrs) to a charge period of 11PM-5AM, local time; 2) this charge period must be coordinated with the EPRI and local power companies to determine whether the off-peak rate is available only at 240V and whether demand metering is required.
I whole heartedly agree.
#33 jes wrote:
THERE IS A VERY BIG NEED TO EDUCATE THE PUBLIC!
Yes, there is a real need to educate the public about all of this technology.
The sooner the better.
How about teasers like…
It’s coming !
or
The Next Big Thing ! (don’t be left out)
Look at what the Federal Government is doing now concerning Digital Television. I see those “DTV Answers” commercials all the time.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:46 pm)Not related to this topic – but another EV-supercar has surfaced
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/07/22/lightning_fast_charge_supercar/
its only 120,000… POUNDS
~$250,000.. haha.
It does have quickcharge though
They claim the batteries don’t need heating or cooling, and can work at -30c…
Why don’t I believe that? Seems too good to be true.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:46 pm)First off this is a great site it has now become a part of my daily readings.
With regards to a Vehicle to Grid (VtG) application it is a whole different animal to what people are used too. VtG is a wonderful concept that will happen at some point, it is basically where the battery from the car can FEED INTO the utility grid as well as accepting a CHARGE FROM the utility grid.
The vehicles that are VtG will need some form of commonality like we see with USB ports on computers. The Paddles (plug), Voltage and AMPs especially at Malls etc need to have this commonality otherwise confusion could reign as different manufactures and venders could be shut out of different regions.
With a VtG feeding back into the grid, there has to be a feed in tariff rate set by the utility or through the State Energy Corporation Commissions. The utility might have to be legislated to accept a VtG as that now makes you a power provider. With home solar and wind turbine systems this is not a big issue as such, other than getting the Utility to pay a “fair” feed in fee for the kWhrs provided.
The other issue is any VtG set-up has to have some form of inverter at the service entrance box, Utilities will not allow any power fed into the grid without one, the reason is if the power were to go down the utility cannot have lines that are still live (hot) by Solar, Wind or VtG, the lineman do not liked get shocked when doing repairs to the system.
The VtG world will come around but safeguards’ ands commonalities must be met.
Geoff
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:48 pm)The Grump,
Why the Volt needs a 140HP engine…
The Volt needs an engine with real power, because that engine needs to meet the power needs of the car under all conditions and when the energy from the batteries is depleted.
A 10HP motor might make enough power for 90% of driving conditions. But if you tried to drive it up a long mountain road, it would slow to a 10HP crawl after the batteries were depleted. Needless to say, the result would be a huge trashing of the Volt by competitors and the media.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (12:58 pm)It’s amazing how people in California think they are the whole country. Much of the country, such as where I live, does not have different electric rates at different times of the day. We also do not have a shortage of grid transmission lines, or a shortage of generating capacity. We do not have rolling blackouts, and we do not have our utilities turning things on and off for us in our own houses.
I can see that the Volt is and will be made primarily for California — good luck with it. In thinking about issues more broadly, however, please do not assume that the whole world wishes to be like you are.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:02 pm)#84 nasaman
I’m not sure how important off-peak charging is for the individual. I don’t think many consumers have time of day metering. It’s certainly not the case here in CA or in any of the other states I’ve lived.
On the other hand, collectively and for the utilities this is absolutely huge. Most of the time utilities have more electricity than they can sell, which is too bad since, unlike oil, electricity can’t be stored. If the electrical utilities could sell this excess capacity and put it to use charging electrical vehicles, then every penny paid ends up as net profit for the companies. Additionally, since this additional revenue doesn’t require any additional cost, average cost per kWh sold will decrease, and this savings can be passed on to consumers in the form of lower kWh charges.
Alternatively, as you suggest, you could have time of day and season pricing, each with different different pricing — but this requres time of day metering. At the extreme end you have the idea of being able to actually sell your electricity back to the utilities in peak periods but this requires some relatively expensive infrastructure which makes it seemingly quixotic.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:02 pm)Regarding VTG…
I think it’s a little premature to be worrying about VTG at this point. It will be several years before there are enough electric cars where they can actually impact the grid in any significant way.
Also, even if you could do VTG now, each time you use the feature you would be cycling your very expensive battery system, making it wear out sooner. Probably not worth it for the small amount of $ you would make selling back the electricity. Some day, when batteries become much cheaper or much more durable, then the cost of the extra VTG cycles goes down.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:04 pm)There is’nt much that needs to be done to the grid in order to accommodate the Volt.
Its really just a question of where to put the charging stations in the urban environment.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/greentech-car,5941.html
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:05 pm)84 nasaman
“1) The charger circuits MUST include a timer that’s driver settable & overridable but that defaults (after, say, 8 hrs) to a charge period of 11PM-5AM, local time;”
Yes. Now that we are thinking along those lines, what about another setting that allows the utility to pick the time w/i a 24 hour period, which would be the cheapest (read, most convenient for the utility). This, too, could be overridable.
Many people today have flex schedules, work at home, etc. and could benefit from their own flexibility.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:11 pm)I hope they work all of this stuff out….it is nice to see the continued focus on dotting all the i’s and crossing all the t’s….
We wouldn’t want to live in a world where your license plate number determines whether or not you are allowed to plug in, much less actually get in and drive!
I am thankful to already be “educated” on this technology… Car use electric motor — powered by battery — plug battery in to charge — battery run out — flex fuel engine charge battery — electric motor keep turning wheels — car move forward
I’m looking forward to the marketing… I cant stand all the ‘hydrogen’ based car commercials already on the air (oh yeah, I’m one of those “hydrogen is a diversion by big oil” people)
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:19 pm)“It’s amazing how people in California think they are the whole country. Much of the country, such as where I live, does not have different electric rates at different times of the day. We also do not have a shortage of grid transmission lines, or a shortage of generating capacity. We do not have rolling blackouts, and we do not have our utilities turning things on and off for us in our own houses.”
Well good for you
)
About 5 years ago, Ontario was all of those bad things described (well in peak time, hot summer days), and we have nowhere near the population of Cali nor the energy hoggers.
Just because its working fine now doesn’t mean things won’t/can’t change in the future (especially once people start using electric cars)
What may be working now could overload everything in the future.
Ontario has turned things around, and we’re actually exporting more electricity than we use (probably to the states?)
In 5 years they have changed their operations to ensure we don’t run out of power – if they could do that now, then in 5 years, most electrical grids can be ready for mass-marketed plugin cars.
(It took a massive blackout for them to fix things here, lets hope it wont come to that in other states/provinces
Oh, and we’ll be starting time of use (TOU) meters all across Ontario by 2009/2010.
It’s not just California.
Some cities are using them right now (Parts of Toronto, etc.)
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:24 pm)Actually, I see this announcement as somewhat bad news. The implication is that our current grid won’t be able to support the Volt.
This type of implication is not correct. Here’s a quote from the recent NOVA program “Car of the Future”:
“DAVID GREENE: Our existing electric utility system could handle tens of millions of plug-in hybrid vehicles if they would be recharged during off-peak times, such as at night.”
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/programs/ht/tm/3507.html?site=22&pl=wmp&rate=hi&ch=5
With regard to the article and Brita Gross’s three points:
1) If everyone plugs in at night, there will be no problem. So the best thing the power companies can do is encourage people to plug in at night. The easiest way to do this is charge significantly less per KWh at night, and significantly more during the day. In fact, new electric meters that measure time of day usage are already being installed in many homes across America. So this is already happening.
2) Public education will be a non-issue. If running on electricity remains 4 times less expensive than gasoline, then people will take the time to figure it out. As an analogy, how long did it take for normal, non-geek type people to learn how to download music from the Internet? Money is a big motivator. Of course, if the Volt ends up costing $40K, then all the public education in the world won’t help. At $40K, the Volt will always be a niche car. Most people won’t be willing to pay more to drive electric.
3) It would be great to involve power companies in legislation that promotes plug-in cars. This is the only point Brita makes that I agree with. The electric power companies, as well as all the companies that provide fuel to supply electricity, stand to make a lot more money if plug-ins become mainstream. So it would be great to get them involved in lobbying for legislation that promotes plug-ins. This would do a lot to offset the oil lobby.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:27 pm)Here’s another article on this subject:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/07/22/news/companies/gm_electric.ap/index.htm?postversion=2008072204
“This vehicle is real. It’s coming into production,” said Britta Gross, a GM engineer who is helping to build the infrastructure for cars of the future”……”We want this to sell in just huge volumes, so we want to get it right,” she said.
Also, in this article:
http://www.reuters.com/article/companyNews/idUSN2147289020080722
In an interview, General Motors’ manager of hydrogen and electrical infrastructure commercialization, Britta Gross, said utilities would be key to not only raising consumer awareness about plug-in vehicles, but also implementing an infrastructure for public charging stations.
“The issue is going to be how many consumers have plugs in the right places in their garage?,” Gross said. “How many people don’t even have garages? We have to have a public charging infrastructure put in place and a strategy for that with corporations and municipalities. That’s where the utilities are going to be very helpful to us.”
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:30 pm)canehdian
I’m in Ontario as well. Thank you for furthering the Canadian stereotype ‘eh. How bout them leafs? Think Mats will re-sign with them?
Ontario is looking pretty promising right now energy wise. We have a new refinery that’s supposed to be built about 30 minutes from my city in the next few years, there is an ethanol plant in my city as well, wind turbines are here now too, and we have 3 bio-diesel gas stations. Exciting times.
Chris
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:31 pm)#85 Rashid
“Did I miss something? Thanks.”
I don’t know honestly,
My point in a simplistic way was trying to say what this is about. (see post earlier up about education…)
Some people think this is treating them like idiots.(I know how to use a plug) when in reality that is not what the “educating the public” is about., or others as a cash grab..it is about governemetn money, but there is SSOOO much more then here is a car, here is a cord..have fun..if it was that simple, Tonka would have the first EV…Whya re Toyatota and Ford working with the Calif Utility for EV’s if they are not really required, aren’t Californians able to work a plug? The Utilities HAVE to be involved.
Being in a manufacturing industry myself that uses and interacts with utilities with our products, when we devolloped a new idea, a first of its kind thing that would affect the grid, we have to do the same steps as GM, nothing like it was around, and develloping a standard was CRUCIAL, (it too by the way uses 120 volts, regular extension cords etc…) but because it is a first, there were no standards, either for construction, application, installation, code requirements had to be addressed, utility companies were involved..
THe WHOLE process is a massive undertaking, our idea is small niche, and will not get the major headlines (yet!), but hte VOLT is huge for a HUGE company, so it garners the lions share of attention. Many manufacturing firms do this, but it is a small potatoes venture compared to the volt..but we all need to address the standards, and if there are not, devellop them. That GM is doing this is a positive step to brining the Volt to the market.
Like Hydrogen vehicles..there is NO infrastructure to support it..there has to be one,and there will have to be standard for it,and Hydrogen manufacturers will have to deal with the auto companies about it….
That is reality
Mitch
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:34 pm)GM & EPRI should also discuss standards for wireless power technology: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_energy_transfer
Although there are efficiency losses compared to hard wired, wireless is less susceptible to vandalism and would be ideal for unsecured areas such as public parking lots, motels and open apartment parking. The customer could swipe his credit card in the office, then be given the code to enter in a smart receiver under the hood, and be billed according to duration of the metered current draw (actual power, not total time, since draw may be pulsed).
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:35 pm)#98 Chris
The new Shell refinery near Sarnia was killed almost 2 weeks ago…
Sorry dude
Mitch
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:37 pm)#89 Paul-R says: “The Volt needs an engine with real power, because that engine needs to meet the power needs of the car under all conditions and when the energy from the batteries is depleted.”
————————————————————————————–
The energy from the batteries will never be depleted in any normal real world scenario.
If your daily commute includes significantly more that 40 miles of very steep mountain grades, then the battery will discharge below 30% regularly, and the battery will wear out sooner, perhaps in 5 years instead of 10. But this type of daily commute will wear out any type of car faster. In addition, this type of daily commute is very rare, perhaps around 0.1% of the population.
On the other hand, if you drive very steep mountain grades occasionally, then the battery will discharge below 30% occasionally, which probably won’t affect battery life in any significant way. This type of scenario is much more common, and the Volt should have no problem with it.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:44 pm)I agree with Paul-R (#92): I don’t want some faceless utility deciding when and how much to cycle my car’s batteries. I can see how something like this might be forced upon those who plug in during the day. However, if this is based in any way on the home electricity generator’s “sell excess power back to the utility” scheme, you’ll get less for the power you “give” than you’re charged for what you “get.” I’d want to be assured in any case that V2G didn’t rip me off by taking power away at a rate lower than what I paid.
If I charge off-peak, drive 10 miles and plug in, am I going to lose 20 miles worth of power to run the grid during the time I’m stopped?
It will take years for there to be enough cars (never mind the interface) to make this possible. In that time, I’d far rather see the utilities invest in their own (sodium-sulfur) battery technology for load leveling, and then pay money for used Volt batteries when they start becoming available.
It would also pay the utilities to get more involved in subsidizing solar arrays at the local level (homes and businesses), since they produce maximum power at about the time commuters would be getting a recharge at work. Most of them unplug and take to the roads ahead of 5:00 – 5:30, leaving a couple hours of sunlight free for the afternoon power crunch.
Something like this lessens the extent to which individuals must surrender to some kind of central control / tracking requirement.
===
About road taxes: if a system is established which bases road use on mileage, they ought to take the embedded gas tax away and treat everyone the same. Such a system should tax differently based on the weight of the vehicle, as well.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:44 pm)#74 & #76:
Yes to $30,000, No to $40,000.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:53 pm)From chevrolet.com: “The EV1 quickly became the worldwide benchmark for electric vehicles, but its timing wasn’t quite right…. We didn’t kill the electric car; electric vehicle technology is far from dead.”
GM – YOU DID KILL THE ELECTRIC CAR.
GM was ‘serious’ about the EV1, they poured millions into its development.
Then they failed to whip up any consumer interest in the car, failed to market it and failed to even show pictures of it to the mass market – me for instance.
Then they cancelled development, capped the leases at 800, called the thing a failure and blamed who? YOU.
GM even refused to allow the leased EV1 to be purchased by willing customers, many of whom videotaped their beloved cars being towed away.
Those cars were all crushed.
Ten years on, after Toyota proved it was possible to sell a 100+ mile range EV (the RAV4 EV) GM comes up with the ‘Volt’.
And you lot are talking about this ‘Volt’ thing as if it will actually be made!
How gullible are the American people?
Well, it’ll be 2012 before the light goes on and you figure out that all those unfortunate ‘issues’ keeping the Volt from production are deliberate. Then the Volt program will be nixed as a commercial failure and GM will trundle out some lame 42mpg subcompact called the Neo to placate the greens.
And guess who GM will blame?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (1:54 pm)Paul-R #89
A 140 hp engine is excessive, unless you live in a mountainous area.
A 3,000 lb. car going up an 8% grade requires 48 kW (64 hp) to maintain a speed of 65 mph. The breakdown of this 48 kW is as follows:
o 4 kW for rolling friction,
o 9 kW for aerodynamic drag, and
o 31 kW to go uphill, i.e., make the grade
o 4 kW for electrical losses (10%).
To put this in perspective, consider the average 7.2% grade of the Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb of 1,439 meters over a 20 kilometer road.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pikes_Peak_International_Hill_Climb
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:00 pm)91 Don C
1. “I’m not sure how important off-peak charging is for the individual. I don’t think many consumers have time of day metering. It’s certainly not the case here in CA or in any of the other states I’ve lived.”
There are plenty of areas that have or are implementing a time-of-use plans, do not do broad brush strokes on this. Look up PURPA TIME-BASED METERING AND COMMUNICATIONS (see EPACT 2005 Sec. 1252) http://www.oe.energy.gov/purpa.htm
CA has a bunch of utilities and Municipals that follow these rules.
2. “On the other hand, collectively and for the utilities this is absolutely huge. Most of the time utilities have more electricity than they can sell, which is too bad since, unlike oil, electricity can’t be stored. If the electrical utilities could sell this excess capacity and put it to use charging electrical vehicles, then every penny paid ends up as net profit for the companies.”
Actually electricity is stored behind a dam, in a coal pile, underground in caverns, etc. With electricity the supply must meet the demand; those electrons need to go somewhere.
3. “Additionally, since this additional revenue doesn’t require any additional cost, average cost per kWh sold will decrease, and this savings can be passed on to consumers in the form of lower kWh charges.”
You are talking about avoided cost here and there again are rules about avoided cost rates.
I don’t mean to nit pic here but there is too much mis-information in this.
Cheers
Geoff
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:00 pm)#89 Paul-R “Why the Volt needs a 140HP engine…
The Volt needs an engine with real power, because that engine needs to meet the power needs of the car under all conditions and when the energy from the batteries is depleted.
A 10HP motor might make enough power for 90% of driving conditions. But if you tried to drive it up a long mountain road, it would slow to a 10HP crawl after the batteries were depleted. Needless to say, the result would be a huge trashing of the Volt by competitors and the media.”
———————————————————
Well, that’s a great generic answer Paul, but do we really need all 140 ponies to get us up that long mountain road with depleted batteries? That’s a lot of horsepower for one generator – especially a generator that is supposed to be turning at one set speed when in use, a speed that is optimized for the engine’s design.
Nasaman, can you figure this one out ? Are we being bamboozled by good ol’ Bob ?
Personally, I trust Maximum Bob as far as I can spit a Jeep. (That isn’t very far, BTW). I believe he’s trying to save money by using a prebuilt engine, and shoehorning it into the Volt. Cheap, yes. Gas efficient? We’ll see.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:02 pm)(#105):
The EV1 subject has already been beaten to death here, Neil. Take it somewhere else, please.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:15 pm)As said in a previous post, the whole point of a 4 cyl. engine is that it is more efficient than a smaller engine at the desired power level. Peak efficiency is gained at about 1600 rpm.
This is why a large vehicle burbling along on the highway will get better fuel economy at the same speed than a smaller engined vehicle running at 3000 rpm. Forget miles per gallon. Look at how boats operate as an example, because the principle is the same. One has a prop, the other has a generator. Its the power band that matters.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:18 pm)Former Intel CEO Andy Grove spoke at the Plug-In 2008 conference in San Jose today. I hear he’s trying to get the electric utilities to offer FREE electricity from charging stations for the first 2 years they make them available in a given area …. in order to jump start electric cars, ER-EVs, etc.
Now THAT sounds like a hell of an idea. It sounds like marketing 101 to me. If you want to get people to switch to a new product, why not offer them “free samples” like they do at the grocery stores sometimes. The electric utilities know they’ll be making money from those charging stations down the road. Big Oil and OPEC would be freaking out about it of course.
You’ll see new Volt owners in 2011 coming in to work or wherever talking about how they don’t have pay ANYTHING to run their Volt for the first 40 miles. Volt owners who drive under 40 miles a day would pay $0 for “fuel” for the first 2 years … if they charge it at a charging station.
This would get a LOT more charging stations built. The demand for them would skyrocket. You’d see apartment complexes getting charging stations pretty quick. Not everyone owns or rents a house you know. The electric utilities ought to have all sorts of these kinds of incentives to get the charging stations built. They’ll probably make back their money easily down the road … especially if the batteries for electric cars and ER-EVs like the Volt get a lot cheaper (which they should).
Jul 22nd, 2008 (2:42 pm)This is an article in the San Jose Mercury News about a deal San Jose is making to allow EVs to be able to charge at light posts.
http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_9960395
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:06 pm)i guess people forget that.. there are home mechanics.. like old guys tinkering with there cars.. or teenagers who monkey under the hood. .. i guess we should forget about educating them what the hell a electirc motor will do for them un der the hood? +
people will take their ice out
people will try swappingin a biger electric motor…
see any problems commin? yes i do
getting zaped or destroying key parts in ur car trying to swap out parts… like u would do in ur old camaro for instance is alot easier and safer imo ,,education im all for that lol.
on a side note .. even if the gas prices do dip back to normal for alittle bit in 2010 or 2009 the consumers and the public will have it fresh in there memorys RIGHT? well take advantage of it ..
saying stuff like this in ur commericals GM..
tired of being victims to flacuating gas prices? tired of being apunching bag to investors ? looking for relief and saftey from an uncertain and volitile market place? want national security ?
things like that will do alot to make people want 1/5th the cost of gas
want american pride back.. want to stick it to the man…* oil companys/investors*
people are tired of the oiil companys .. take advantage of it while u can before memory starts to fade in a few years * if prices start to drop back to a normal level*
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:10 pm)Sounds like a huge public works project that’s just going to produce more spending.
Now why not go the other way and cut back on consumption?
Most of the people drive alone – statistics have proven that time and again.
With something like the VW 1L car ( http://blog.wired.com/cars/2008/07/laugh-at-high-g.html ) even the usual diesel-petroleum world would not be so bad. Well, at least increasing the average MPG from 30 to 200 would be a good start – providing more time for major re-arrangements. Be it the power-grid or battery technlogoy.
I know I know – the 1L is uncool. But hey, if uncool will save the world, then so be it. Besides – it’s not SO uncool and can esily be made to look much cooler! Oh, btw – for those of us treating a car not as a status symbol, but simply as means of transportation – the Volt does not have to be so cool either. Prius already proved that point..
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:22 pm)107 Peaking in PHX
“There are plenty of areas that have or are implementing a time-of-use plans, do not do broad brush strokes on this.”
You changed the statement. There is a big difference between what is available and what consumers have. As you point out, the option is available, but very few consumers have time of use metering. In many places consumers may need to either buy the meter or lease it — which is quite the cold shower. For those who don’t have to pay for a meter, very few have chosen to do so. Bottom line: time of use metering is the exception. In fact, it’s so unusual that the NY Times wrote a story about it this week. You can find that here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/21/nyregion/21peak.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=time%20of%20day%20pricing&st=cse&oref=slogin
“Actually electricity is stored behind a dam, in a coal pile, underground in caverns, etc. With electricity the supply must meet the demand; those electrons need to go somewhere.”
Sadly this is not how it works. The supply of electricity is extremely inelastic during the course of a day. And it can’t be stored in a cavern (a battery yes but that would be one large battery). While it’s true some sources, such as gas fired plants, can be turned on or off fairly easily in a given time window, other sources, like hydroelectric and nuclear plants, can’t.
You actually don’t have to believe me, because the factual premise underlying this thread proves the point. If it’s true that supply can be easily matched to demand, then there would be no excess capacity, and, because we would have no excess capacity, there would be no need or reason for peak and off-peak pricing. (Peak pricing is a scheme to time shift demand). In a sense, the existence of peak pricing proves your point wrong.
“You are talking about avoided cost here and there again are rules about avoided cost rates.”
Avoided costs are not at issue here. A regulatory concept rather than an economic concept, avoided costs relate to avoiding the excess capacity we’re assuming here. They play no role once the excess capacity is in play. I believe the seminal idea for avoided costs was the RAND Corporation’s proposal, put forth in the 60′s, that NY City promote conservation rather than increasing the supply of drinking water by building a new dam. (NY City built the dam and, as it turned out, they were “damn” glad they did).
“I don’t mean to nit pic here but there is too much mis-information in this.”
No problems. I don’t take this type of thing personal.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:33 pm)Sorry if I’m repeating; don’t have time today to read all 113 posts above.
What’s going on here is that GM and the power companies need each other in order for the Volt to work. Given that most of our population lives in urban centers, the power companies absolutely have to make major infrastructure adjustments for people to be able to charge in condos and apartment buildings. And just maybe the power companies are getting a little scared by all the talk of solar, wind, natural gas, T. Boone Pickens, etc. They need to keep their customer base up.
As an aside, I have visions of teenage kids walking through apartment building parking lots at night unplugging everyone Volts! (something I probably would have done at that age)
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:41 pm)_____________________________________________________
This is all positive news.
Big smile here.
America is ready to plug-in!
GO GM-VOLT!
_____________________________________________________
Jul 22nd, 2008 (3:45 pm)115. Jeremy
I agree with you. If GM and the other car companies can get some affordable hybrids like the Volt on the road that get rave reviews from the automotive press, people will buy millions of them.
There will have MILLIONS of people thoroughly enjoying “sticking it to THE MAN” …. Big Oil and OPEC.
People will want to want to give Bob Lutz and the people working on the Volt project “high fives” if they get a chance. The Volt development team might become like the engineers and astronauts who worked on the Apollo missions to the moon in the 60s. They’ll be popular people that get a lot of respect, accolades … maybe a bunch of interviews on the talk show circuit, etc. I’m looking forward to the day the Volt blasts off in late 2010. It’ll be a big year in the whole auto industry.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:02 pm)NP@106, great post. So the three output levels of the ICE could be 8KW, 25KW and 48KW, just about max for the Volt’s 53 KW generator.
So the 1.4 liter engine could hand peak demand, around 70 hp, without breaking into a sweat, or in other words while still operating in its peak efficiency zone of operation.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:07 pm)#55 THOM
Can you drill for oil in your backyard? I’m going to go out on a limb and say that you most likely can’t.
On the other hand, you CAN install solar and wind power to your home to either offset or replace your current need thus making you impervious to such energy price fluxuations.
Actually, if you were tied in to the grid (to sell back energy), YOU could be like one of those companies and fleece the rest of us on the excess clean energy you were producing! Think of the possibilities
. People everywhere would call you Sheik THOM or Big THOM
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:11 pm)#117 CDAVIS
With greatest respect, of all the posts Lyle has made, I find this one and the discussion above the most discouraging. I now realize that this car is buried under layers of lawyers and bureaucrats who will hyper regulate plug-in charging under various hypothetical catastrophe theories. Individuals will be hasseled over special charging cords, getting their home wiring to meet code, the communication system between the car and the utility, and then, most frustrating of all, the car will not be allowed to charge unless it is at a time when it is to the advantage of the utility. None of this is to mention the complexity of asking for tax credits, which will be another bureaucratic adventure, I’m afraid.
I just don’t see why I will want to do this, or why any other sensible individual will want to. Just getting the right permits and inspections for new home/garage electrical wiring will be tedious enough, especially when the electrical utility becomes involved with a required communication system.
Maybe the Volt can be used for fleet sales to big corporations, who have staff and lawyers to deal with all of these layers.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:14 pm)Jes #28 & #37,
If you are a “renewable engineering” major and think these agit propaganda POSes are educational, then I fear for the coming generation of Engineers.
Oh well, the Chinese will carry on the traditions of my Engineering profession, if that’s the case.
“The Inconcievable Truth’ is fiction prepared by a charlatan, in it for the money, who has never succesully completed more than one introductory science course in his entire life (and he came damn near flunking that too).
I didn’t go to televangelists Jimmy Lee Bakker or Billy Sunday or Pat Robertson, to learn Thermodynamics or Kinematics. If you do, Oh brother!
Algore is trained to be a bible-thumper and failed at that too. He dropped out before being asked to leave divinity school. It shows how intelligent the fellow is that he failed God? How to you fail God?
If it weren’t for Daddy’s oil millions, he would be jerking soda in an ice cream parlor.
If you want to do some professional reading try:
“Greenhouse Effect in semi-transparent Planetary Atmospheres “, Dr. Ferenc M Miskolczi, Journal of the Hungarian Meterorological Society Vol III, No 1 January-March 2007, pp 1-40.
Or just Google it. It’s all over the web since the paper is one of the most referenced papers of the past decade. Everyone is talking about it and Hansen has sent his minions out in numbers to valiently try to slow and to discredit it, to little avail.
Others are saying its a tremendous advance in the theoretical understanding of atmospheres. While you are at it, look at your shoetops and try to find the vacuum that Hansen et al, says MUST exist between your shoetops and the soles of your feet. AGW theory absolutely MANDATES, that it to be there. Are you having problems finding it?
In the meantime why does no one speak of the thermal pollution problem and Solar Energy? Albedo Reduction is a prime concern, in any Global Warming scenario.
I assume you have studied some EE and know about resonances. So how do you damp electric Grid resonances when instantaneous variable generation from solar or windmills, constantly sloshes big chunks of power about the Grid? Or do you just accept lots of grid-wide blackouts?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:20 pm)I’m going to give away my age here a bit; but does anyone remember public telephones?
You see, kids; telephones used to be ENORMOUS, and they weren’t portable at all. So if you were out somewhere and needed to call home, you had to put a dime, or quarter into a giant plastic or steel box with a cord and handset on it. It was just so unreal, dude.
My point is, remember the cord to the handset? It was usually wrapped in a spiral of flexible steel cladding. This didn’t prevent determined vandalism, but deterred it enough to make the pay phone possible at a quarter a pop.
All these public charging stations could take note. I wonder if an armored wire could reel out of a slot with a multi-sided adaptor on the end for various kinds of cars (or just GM’s, if it becomes the de-facto standard).
Some kind of hand-shaking would have to go on between a chipset in the car and the charging station before the wire actually goes ‘live’ (necessary for billing, anyway). That sort of thing ought to be looked at now (or be easily added later to early Volts).
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:27 pm)First of all, let me assure everyone that “stas peterson” is not some alternate ID that I concocted for entry #122. I’m perfectly willing to ‘stir the puddin’ under the name “Jackson.”
That said, I will happily throw some gas on the fire (now that we don’t need it for cars anymore):
http://www.dailytech.com/Myth+of+Consensus+Explodes+APS+Opens+Global+Warming+Debate/article12403.htm
Jul 22nd, 2008 (4:42 pm)#124 stas peterson
It’s not really of great interest to me, and I haven’t seen the film, but I will say that the vast majority of scientists who do study these things seem to say that climate change is real. It’s not one person, it’s a consensus of a very large number of people working in the field.
Of course you can always find dissenting voices. Every so often they’re right, but most times they’re wrong. My brother the Yale PhD research scientist is a huge skeptic about global warming, and he tends to pontificate a bit, until I remind him of the fact that the last time he was so skeptical was about the link between smoking and cancer. He had all kinds of reasons why that wasn’t true as well but eventually he came around. My guess this is another of those instances.
My personal feeling is that this entire controversy was created by Fox New — just because they decided global warming was a liberal cause and therefore by reflex had to attack it — and it no longer has much to do with science.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:05 pm)Hydro Electric Power
http://www.nwhydro.org/
http://www.hydro.org/index.php
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/solar.renewables/page/hydroelec/hydroelec.html
http://www.hydronews.net/
http://www.eia.doe.gov/fuelelectric.html
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:10 pm)Supposedly Deregulation failed in California, Texas, and Connecticutt among others. I can only speak to the first two and I know of what I speak.
California demagogues didn’t allow enough electric generation to be built in order to go ‘Green’ and save money with un-neccessary things, like building new electric plants, while there was still enough electricty to meet demand.
When demand was more than the generation available, they called in the deregualtors. When you still can’t get ten pounds from a five pound bag, don’t blame the demagogues, change the subject, blame and punish the deregulators. Change the legal ground- rules and bankrupt them. If they did anything wrong at all, prosecute them too. Bye, bye Enron.
California ended up crash building once-thru natural gas tubo generators, the least efficient plants imagineable. They copy-catted the deregualtors too, and bought and imported power from neighboring States.
The problem just continued to grow, in the background. California was suffering blackouts with 3% missing power. Now they import from Arizona, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Utah and Colorado and even third world Mexico, and generate only 85% of demand. It has stripped reserves low in every other state, over time. Sooner, not later, one state utility commision is going to say no more exports, state reserves are too low, and its utilities will have to conform by law, cutting off California. If one does it all will have to do it, to save themselves. Watch the blackouts in California spread, then. Kiss a tree. Hug a treehugger.
In Texas, T Boone Pickens used deregulation to erect a pile of windmills out in the barrens of Texas, unconnected to the Texas grid. The only problem is the variable power generation from the changing winds means his mini-grid is very unstable, constantly producing blackouts. The same phenomenon has appeared in ther UK, the Netherlands, and Denmark where they have gotten continuously variable wind up to about 20% of total generation.
Our forefathers had windmills when electricity came in, in the 1870-1890s, and they abandoned it; now we are re-learning the reasons, why. Many an EE has had to referesh himself on Grid stability issues, and “Imaginary Power Flows”.
Now TBP is trying to rescue his mini-grid by the only way possible, tying into a much larger, stable, base-load, Grid, that can damp his constantly swinging wind generators. To do so, he needs Right of Way for power lines, he doesn’t have, (and just by the way, a gas pipeline beneath them, too) to bring his products to market, and also stabilize his mini grid.
Ol ‘ TB Pickens is no fool, he’s trying to get you to pay for his shortsighted, foolishness, with a few adverts. Ever wonder why ? Now you know.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:27 pm)Our local NPR station just announced that there would be a report on this collaboration this afternoon. Maybe on All Things Considered.
More good “ink” for GM and the Volt.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:32 pm)Chevy volt — solar garage = very inexpensive driving. Go GM Go Volt. Nice cheer section now where is my VOLT? TED
Jul 22nd, 2008 (5:52 pm)You know what would be nice? For GM to build a new Corvette electric car with the kind of technology used in this new Lightning GT car.
http://www.auto123.com/en/news/car-news/lightning-strikes-with-a-740-hp-electric-two-seater?artid=99602
http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/news/autoexpressnews/225486/lightning_gt.html
This car will probably cost $200,000+ but people that buy the Corvette ZR-1 might be able to swing that kind of cash … well, maybe $110,000 like the Tesla is going for. The Lightning GT does 0-60 in less than 4 seconds, has an all electric range of about 200 miles and a top speed of 130+ mph. 740 horses. This car will get respect from the Porsche and Ferrari drivers on the autobahn in Europe. Cars on the autobahn won’t even hear it coming until it blows their doors off. Just a whoosh and then you say … what the HECK was that!
Hopefully, by 2020, they can mass produce these kinds of batteries and everyone can actually afford one. Til then, the Lightning GT will be like a supermodel to us average car buyers. They’re awesome but you’re just not likely to get one unless you win the lottery or become a rock star.
What’s really awesome about this car is that it can recharge in 10 minutes. That’s what everyone will be hoping for in the next 10 years … batteries that charge as fast as you can fill up a gas tank.
It just goes to show you that the technology for doing this DOES exist right now. You just have to pay an arm and a leg for it in the next few years. The electric utilities better be working on projects that will factor in THESE kinds of electric cars that recharge very quickly. Lots of high voltage and all that.
It might take awhile for electric cars like this to get here in large numbers, but they are coming. The car makers and the electric utilities need to anticipate these kinds of things as they standardize their charging systems and other infrastructure. They might have to have different voltage “charging cords” at charging stations like we have Regular and Premium gasoline. Who knows? I just know the car companies and utilities better try to think of EVERYTHING that might happen with electric cars over the next 20 years.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:03 pm)So, what is the price point on oil?
If you are about to plop down $40,000 of your hard -earned (at least for most) money, and the price of gas is X$/gal, would you make the purchase? Even if gas dropped to under, say $2/gal?
Come on, now you purist, who want to kill big oil, how pure are you now?
I say it will be easy for big Oil (who some call evil/bad/expletive), to knock out the Volt, if they want to.
I guarantee if gas dropped below $2/gal, maybe even $3, that the Volt would suddenly become a faint memory to many. I would be willing to wager that you would see all those gas-sucking SUV’s back on the road.
So, how far does the price of gas have to drop for you to give up the dream?
I’m thinking a lot of people “forget” the Volt. I could be wrong, but not usually…. : )
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:25 pm)Dave G, you stated:
“The energy from the batteries will never be depleted in any normal real world scenario.”
I don’t agree with that statement, nor do I think GM does. From their perspective, the battery is “depleted” when it reaches 30%. I suspect the Volt computers will not allow the battery to go below 30% for any reason. The car will stop first. I suspect they will modulate the ICE throttle to match the power needs of the motor and try to keep the battery at exactly 30% so as not to cycle the battery unnecessarily. In that case, the battery would only climb above 30% from regenerative braking or charging from a wall socket. I predict battery life will be treated as an unknown by GM until it is proven (say for 10 years) in the field. In the mean time, they are not going to take chances with the battery, because if they get it wrong they’re screwed.
If my assumptions above are correct, it means the ICE must be sized to provide PEAK power, not just AVERAGE power. Maybe in ten years (when batteries are higher capacity and lower cost and their durability has been proven in the field) that will no longer be the case, and then the ICE can be downsized or eliminated completely.
Hopefully in ten years, we’ll know if I’m right.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:45 pm)#122 Van – “So the three output levels of the ICE could be 8KW, 25KW and 48KW, just about max for the Volt’s 53 KW generator.
So the 1.4 liter engine could hand peak demand, around 70 hp, without breaking into a sweat, or in other words while still operating in its peak efficiency zone of operation.”
———————————————————————————-
Van, where are you getting the multiple power generation levels from ? Isn’t the Volt’s generator supposed to run at only ONE speed, one optimized for the Volt’s engine ? Every time I read about the Volt, the “facts” keep changing. I don’t know what to believe, with so many “experts” constantly contradicting each other with the “facts”.
So is the engine to operate at one set speed all the time, or not ?
And I have yet to get a straight answer – Why are all 140 horses needed just to turn the Volt’s generator ? The engine’s job is to spin a generator, not push a whole car down the road.
—————————————————————————-
BTW, the Volt’s development reminds me of a line from The Empire Strikes Back. Bob Lutz as Darth Vader: “I am altering the deal. Pray I don’t alter it any further.”
To which I say “This deal is getting worse all the time.” The Volt’s now uglier than the concept car, 3-4 years away or more, was under $30000 but now over $40000, useless solar panel roof, now a 4 cyl ICE which could power a car on its own, programmed to charge only at night, half the original gas tank size, and I just can’t wait to see what’s next. It’s like a slow motion train wreck – it’s horrible, but you have to keep watching.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:50 pm)Sure is a lot of garbage on here these days.
Take Care
Arch
Jul 22nd, 2008 (6:51 pm)#133 JEC
You are certainly right about the price of gas driving the move to electrify transportation. We can see what happend to oil consumption when we moved from the 70s’ to the 90s’.
I think you’re wrong, however, on the power of the oil companies. The oil companies have very little control over the price of oil. National oil firms control 80% of the world’s oil, so the multi-nationals are on the outside looking in. (Which is why Iraq is such a huge deal for them). The problem for the multi-nationals going forward is that their tanks are dry. Since new finds are unlikely — as evidenced by the fact they spend 55% of their profits on dividends and stock buy-backs and only 5-6% on exploration and production — the source of their future profits is not very clear, which is why the price/earnings ratios of their stocks are between 12-14 (no growth).
So no, they could not kill the Volt, nor would they have any obvious reason to do so. The energy highway is littered with a lot of roadkill, and the multinationals will probably join them.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:00 pm)135, The Grump says,
BTW, the Volt’s development reminds me of a line from The Empire Strikes Back. Bob Lutz as Darth Vader: “I am altering the deal. Pray I don’t alter it any further.”
To which I say “This deal is getting worse all the time.” The Volt’s now uglier than the concept car, 3-4 years away or more, was under $30000 but now over $40000, useless solar panel roof, now a 4 cyl ICE which could power a car on its own, programmed to charge only at night, half the original gas tank size, and I just can’t wait to see what’s next. It’s like a slow motion train wreck – it’s horrible, but you have to keep watching.
————————
1) I can hear Darth Vader saying that in my head.
2) Most of the rest is correct. Unfortunate, but correct.
I don’t think the 3-4 years away is correct. More like 2-3, unless you are talking about it being affordable for the masses. If so, then I would say 5-6 years away.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:11 pm)133. JEC
One HUGE problem with oil is that the easy/inexpensive to extract “light sweet crude” is getting harder and harder to find. The kind of oil they’re talking about putting on the market is expensive to get out of the ground and refine. The thick, slimy type oil … or the kind mixed in dirt or shale rocks. Then there’s the oil that’s hundreds of feet under the ocean. Expensive to search for it and extract it.
They’re talking about strip mining parts of Colorado and Utah where Aspen and all those fancy ski resorts are. Lots of environmentals over there you know. They extract this “shale oil” like they mine for coal. The locals and the tourists won’t like explosions going off while they are enjoying the great outdoors too much. Who knows it might even set off avalanches when people ski Utah and Colorado. I can visualize some UN-happy campers out there at the Sundance Film Festival. There would be more documentary films about Big Oil for sure if they started blasting up Colorado and Utah.
Another reason why oil probably won’t be going down to $2 a gallon is that MILLIONS of people in China and India are dreaming of getting a car like we did in the 1950s after WWII. They have a growing middle class. They might be selling a LOT of $3,000 Tata cars in India and China in the next few years. Massive amounts of gas is probably going to be guzzled in the next 10 years. Millions more cars will need to be “fed” in the next 10 years. The oil companies are looking at needing 3-4 more Saudi Arabias in order to keep prices as low as they’ve been … like in the 90s.
Oil is one big bucket of oil that everyone draws from. The oil prices are global unless a country has subsidies. What’s to stop OPEC from lowering oil supply just as fast as American oil companies can get it out of the ground in Colorado or wherever? Big Oil and OPEC can play lots of games with oil supply … a la J.R. Ewing in that TV show “Dallas”.
We’re not going to have a choice. We’re going to have to transition our cars from gasoline and diesel over to electricity. Either that or pay Hugo Chavez and the Middle East oil sheiks large portions of your paycheck every month. They’d love for everyone to keep their monster 12 mpg SUVs you know … especially when they swipe their credit cards at the pump every week and pay $100+ a tank for their gas. Hugo and the Middle East oil shieks will be able to buy Embraer Lineage 1000 jets for everyone in their family if we keep on driving low mpg cars and trucks and stay as addicted to their oil.
http://www.embraerexecutivejets.com/english/content/aircraft/lineage1000_home.asp
T. Boone Pickens got billions from his oil business when gas prices weren’t that bad in the 80s or whenever it was. Imagine the cash going to the oil barons these days. It’s unreal. The richest people in the world won’t be Bill Gates and Warren Buffett for long. The top 20 will probably be fatcat oil shieks before long. Do we really want our next couple Presidents to go overseas and beg them to pump more oil like GW Bush had to the past few years? That’s what it’s like to be addicted. The product starts to own YOU instead of the other way around.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:56 pm)There is an interesting article on MSN about how the oil companies are spending their money. Exon for example used 8.8 billion dollars in the first three months of this year in stock buy backs to increase the value of their stock. They made something like 11 billion in profits in the same three months. They seem to be the worst of the bunch, but the pattern is much the same for all of them. They are not investing as much in exploration or refinerys (the future), but in short term schemes to increase the value of their stock.
Someone posted in the thread on the generator motor selection that the 1L and 1.4L motor was tested and the 1.4 was more fuel efficient while meeting the target electric power generation. That is good enough for me.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (7:59 pm)I think many of you are missing the point of this collaboration. GM is saying that there is a major paradigm shift taking place. They are going to produce the Volt in 2 years and then there will be many other plug-in type cars coming after that. I don’t recall the exact numbers but I recall hearing that they expect nearly half of the cars on the road in the coming decades to be plug-ins.
It would be irresponsible for GM to believe that this change is coming and then not talk to the major source of power for these cars. I doubt that it is part of some nefarious plot to screw the consumer in some way. It really seems to be a matter of “OK, power companies. We see the future of cars this way. What should the ‘The Grid’ do to deal with it?”
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:03 pm)Article 1 of the Revised EV Car code:
Section a:
Only American made EVs can be charged on the American Grid.
Section b:
All Japanese cars must be charged in Japan or by a rigged up Huffy.
Section c:
European cars are allowed to charge from the American Grid if they say the magic word (please)
Nothing against Japan but I’m just sick of America selling itself piece by piece…kinda like a WH@RE!
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:12 pm)140 LEN
“Someone posted in the thread on the generator motor selection that the 1L and 1.4L motor was tested and the 1.4 was more fuel efficient while meeting the target electric power generation. That is good enough for me.”
So, that’s all it takes, really?
The 1.4L was a shock to me. My belief was, and I have since been proven wrong (You know that does’nt happen often, or more than a couple times a day) that the Volt would use a very small engine, that kept the batteries charged. That way you can leverage the batteries and use a small generator to keep them charged. This would then allow you to truly apply only AVERAGE power, and the batteries would always be ready to apply PEAK power on-demand.
After some thought, I concluded that the use of a small generator would contradict the Volts “40 miles on battery only” concept. This appears to be the Holy Grail, and if you turned on your small generator to keep the battery charged before reaching 40 miles (actually the generator would probably run most the time) then you violated the 1st commandment.
Could this work? Well it would for most people, but there will always be exceptions. I think for the famous, “up the mountain trip”, that it would be a problem.
So, maybe I am all wet, but when I first learned of the Volt concept that was my understanding of how this would operate. Again, I am wrong (Wow! twice in one posting).
Be Swell
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:13 pm)volt fan i couldnt say it better myself haha and u used better grammer then i . lol
btw JEC u didnt see my post i guess… even if oil companys did go below $2 for a galon of gas.. they owuldnt be able to keep it there for more then a few more years anyway
Besides that the car companys have marketing teams DONT they?
they will make the oil companys the darthvaders strangling americans of there life blood and money.
do u want to be opressed by a shiek? i dont.. i know millions of americans whod agree with me.
and the memory of this opression they are exerting right now. along with oil speculators will sit uneeasy with us for atleast a few years
in that time.. evs will be out… and marketed as the safer alternative.. the cheaper alternative .. the more convienent alternative to gas.. u dont have to go to a gas station get out in middle of the night to get a few galons so u have enough to go to work tomarrow… u dont have to worry about mainence as much * alot les parts to worry about. and its 1 /5th the curent cost of gas
peope would sell there grandmas to save that kinda money.. lol
and u can refer to my above post as how to market the volt even if the prices do come down in the meantime.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:16 pm)#135 The Grump
“Why are all 140 horses needed just to turn the Volt’s generator ? The engine’s job is to spin a generator, not push a whole car down the road.”
Say I wanted to go on a 6-hour trip from San Luis Obispo, California to Lake Tahoe. I’d start with a fully charged battery. After I depleted my AER, the ICE would kick in and I would need to travel about 340 miles with the generator running to maintain my 30% SOC. That generator would need to supply enough electricity to push a whole car up the Sierras. I don’t think a 10-hp ICE/generator could do that.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:29 pm)145
ThombDbhomb
Agreed.
If you let the batteries deplete to 30% charge, your 10HP would not be able to crank out enough amps to keep you running. BUT, what if the 10HP motor started at say 60-70% charge state? I know this violates the 40 mile rule, but would it be capable?
I think so, but this is not Volts methodology and so the answer is NOPE.
Jul 22nd, 2008 (8:37 pm)JEC:
So, your hatred is so strong for a 1.4L engine that you don’t want to go over mountains, go at any sort of highway speed, and almost always have the generator running?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (9:05 pm)Morgan,
Hatred, no. Disappointed, yes.
I keep making the same point, but maybe I am unclear. My initial understanding was the engine would be small generator. When you put the same size engine in the Volt, that you plan to use in the Cruze, then by my standard, you have moved backwards. I thought the 1.0 L seemed oversized for the task, now they need 1.4L.
I do not have any say on the design team, but since this is supposed to be a place to post thoughts, and ideas, that is what I have been doing.
I do enjoy reading all the feedbacks on my posts and others. Some people take it personally, some professionally, I take it with a shot of Jack Daniels.
Sometimes stirring the pot, really gets the flavors rolling, wouldn’t you agree?
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:08 pm)#134 Paul-R,
GM has stated that the ICE/genset will provide 53KW max, and that the electric motor will provide 120KW max. This converts to around 75hp for the ICE and 150hp for the electric motor.
http://gm-volt.com/2007/08/29/latest-chevy-volt-battery-pack-and-generator-details-and-clarifications/
Jul 22nd, 2008 (10:57 pm)Arch,
I agree about the higher than normal garbage qoutient. Let’s hope it’s an aberation.
Be well,
Tag
Jul 22nd, 2008 (11:00 pm)Jeff M #4
“Sadly one thing still bothers me is “Brita Gross who is GMs’ Manager of Hydrogen and Electrical Infrastructure”…. the emphasis still seems to be Hydrogen”
*** *** ***
You’re not the only one bothered by this. However, if recent history is any indication it’s good to keep all options open. Moreover GM could be receiving a lot of H2 research dollars and it’s difficult for any outsider to determine how they’re spent…
. Sometimes a little PR keeps those dollars flowing.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (12:45 am)#146 JEC
“…what if the 10HP motor started at say 60-70% charge state?”
I’d rather the generator kicked on at 30% soc. That way I’d get my 40-mile AER. I rarely drive more than 40-miles in a day. Even if a 10HP motor started at say 60-70% charge state, I wouldn’t get up the Sierras.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (1:14 am)______________________________________________________
Response to #124 RB
You are correct about the tendencies of government taking something good like EVs and throwing ridiculous layers of bureaucracy at it to the point where the average person has a hard time navigating through the mess of it all. Utility companies are geared up and good at navigating through that type of governmental bureaucracy.
Future EV orientated solutions that electric utility companies may in the future provide consumers could for example include installing a standard metered charging station in your garage therefore not requiring the average consumer to himself do all the things that are involved with implementing such an install (hardware selection, hardware purchase, electrician, permits, inspections, etc).
All in all, most electrical utility companies are reasonably consumer friendly. With regards to EV charging times and rates, I would guess that it will end up being similar to the current method for your home; you pay more during peak times but are not denied electricity during any particular day part.
Electric utility companies are in the business of selling energy to consumers therefore they will find consumer centric/friendly ways to deliver that energy to EVs. I’m glad GM is participating in helping get that process started.
The big government gotcha will be Big Brother wanting to recover the gas taxes it will be losing as Americans stop buying gas to power their cars. Government curretnly collects over $80B/year in various gas taxes. For Florida, the total gas tax (federal, state, jobber transport, etc.) comes out to over $0.52/gl. Thats alot of tax revenue at risk!
_____________________________________________________
Jul 23rd, 2008 (2:10 am)#86 nasaman (et al):
I think we’re going to be paying a LOT more than twice as much for our electricity with our electric cars. At least those of us in PG&E territory! If they force us on schedule E-9, it’s a killer.
I’ve been watching the whole move to “smart” metering with my paranoid eye. PG&E has permission from the CPUC to move everyone in their service area (Northern CA) to smart meters by 2012. From what I can find out, they want to be able to control everything in your home. Demand too high? Turn off your A/C for you. Disable your frost free fridge for you (well, the defrost cycle, anyway). They are trying to get the manufacturers of “appliances” (basically, anything you plug in that uses power) to go along with their standards.
I suspect the \Volt isn’t setting new standards here but will be adhering to the ones the power companies have already set up to control your stuff.
This actually doesn’t sound SO bad on the surface; namely, the ability to get cheaper rates in exchange for allowing the power company to shed some of your load during peak usage periods.
Unfortunately, from the history I’ve seen, whenever the power companies get the rate schedules THEY want, we just pay a LOT more for the power at the times they don’t want to sell it to us and get nary a discount on the other times. Here’s how it breaks down:
The “standard” flat rates are E-1
(Note that you can find all rates in greater detail in the tariff book:)
http://www.pge.com/tariffs/ERS.SHTML#ERS
baseline is 11.5 cents/kWh, <130% baseline is 13.1 cents, < 200% baseline is 22.6 cents.
(baseline quantities vary by region, so I won’t even attempt to tell you how much that is). Probably a decent assumption is that most people land into the second tier around 130% of baseline.
The plan that was forced on PG&E for solar users was E-7 (back when Enron was screwing us). PG&E has since got it shut down and replaced it with E-6. Here’s E-7:
Summer: baseline peak: 29.8 cents/kWh
summer: baseline off-peak 8.765 cents/kWh
Winter: baseline off peak/peak: 11.6 cents/kWh
peak is noon to 6PM (M-F), which are prime solar hours (sun is in transit (most direct) at about 1pm). You don’t get any pricing bump on weekends, for your solar power, but on the other hand, you can use your A/C when everyone is home.
Ok, now look at what THEY wanted (and got), E-6:
summer baseline peak 29 cents/kWh
summer baseline part-peak: 14.4 cents/kWh
summer baseline off-peak: 8.4 cents/kWh
Doesn’t sound SO different, right? Devil is in those details:
The kicker: peak is 1pm to 7pm M-F (I don’t know anybody still making any significant power at 7pm from a solar system, and you lose one of the two best hours of production at noon to 1pm).
partial peak is from 10am to 1pm AND 7pm to 9pm (M-F) PLUS 5 to 8pm Saturday and Sunday.
Ummm, from 10am to 9pm you pay MORE than the flat rate. Are you really going to defer all your power usage to outside those times to make this pay off? Really?
But wait, you say! I’ll recharge my car outside those times and it will all work out better for me!
Um, possibly, but probably not. For some time, the CPUC has allowed PG&E to REQUIRE you to switch to schedule E-9 if you have an electric car. Now I note with some dismay that the E-9 schedule declares it is for “Low Emission Vehicles” refueling on your premises.
Let’s look at these beauties:
summer peak 29 cents
summer part peak 11 cents
summer off peak 5 cents
5 cents sounds good, right? Again the devil is in the details. Look at the hours:
Peak 2pm to 9pm M-F
Partial Peak: 7am to 2pm AND 9pm to midnight M-F PLUS 5pm to 9pm on weekends.
Off peak all other hours.
SO, now you’re really hosed if you were trying to power your car with solar panels on your garage. BOTH of your highest performing solar hours are now missing and they drag peak hours out until 9 so you have about 3 hours of zilch production (eg, consumption) at peak rates. Even if you don’t have solar panels (and God help you if you don’t and you’re on E-9) now your rates are incredibly high (almost 3x higher!) for most of the day or about the same as the flat rate just so you can get that 50% off at night!
I read somewhere on the PG&E site that the average customer usage currently is 550kWh/mo. The \Volt would max out at about 8kWh*30 days/mo or 240kWh/mo.
Assuming half that 550kWh is used during peak times on E-9 (which seems low to me, but for the sake of argument). Those 275 kWh will cost like they were 825, just to save 120 off your \Volt cost.
So, your total bill doubled (825 + the other half, 225), AND you still have to add the cost of the electricity of the \Volt (although at half price)! What a deal
We should all be very, very afraid of the power company pricing.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (2:15 am)#86 nasaman (et al):
I think we’re going to be paying a LOT more than twice as much for our electricity with our electric cars. At least those of us in PG&E territory! If they force us on schedule E-9, it’s a killer.
I’ve been watching the whole move to “smart” metering with my paranoid eye. PG&E has permission from the CPUC to move everyone in their service area (Northern CA) to smart meters by 2012. From what I can find out, they want to be able to control everything in your home. Demand too high? Turn off your A/C for you. Disable your frost free fridge for you (well, the defrost cycle, anyway). They are trying to get the manufacturers of “appliances” (basically, anything you plug in that uses power) to go along with their standards.
I suspect the Volt isn’t setting new standards here but will be adhering to the ones the power companies have already set up to control your stuff.
This actually doesn’t sound SO bad on the surface; namely, the ability to get cheaper rates in exchange for allowing the power company to shed some of your load during peak usage periods.
Unfortunately, from the history I’ve seen, whenever the power companies get the rate schedules THEY want, we just pay a LOT more for the power at the times they don’t want to sell it to us and get nary a discount on the other times. Here’s how it breaks down:
The “standard” flat rates are E-1
(Note that you can find all rates in greater detail in the tariff book:)
http://tinyurl.com/6mf85z
baseline is 11.5 cents/kWh, <130% baseline is 13.1 cents, < 200% baseline is 22.6 cents.
(baseline quantities vary by region, so I won’t even attempt to tell you how much that is). Probably a decent assumption is that most people land into the second tier around 130% of baseline.
The plan that was forced on PG&E for solar users was E-7 (back when Enron was screwing us). PG&E has since got it shut down and replaced it with E-6. Here’s E-7:
Summer: baseline peak: 29.8 cents/kWh
summer: baseline off-peak 8.765 cents/kWh
Winter: baseline off peak/peak: 11.6 cents/kWh
peak is noon to 6PM (M-F), which are prime solar hours (sun is in transit (most direct) at about 1pm). You don’t get any pricing bump on weekends, for your solar power, but on the other hand, you can use your A/C when everyone is home.
Ok, now look at what THEY wanted (and got), E-6:
summer baseline peak 29 cents/kWh
summer baseline part-peak: 14.4 cents/kWh
summer baseline off-peak: 8.4 cents/kWh
Doesn’t sound SO different, right? Devil is in those details:
The kicker: peak is 1pm to 7pm M-F (I don’t know anybody still making any significant power at 7pm from a solar system, and you lose one of the two best hours of production at noon to 1pm).
partial peak is from 10am to 1pm AND 7pm to 9pm (M-F) PLUS 5 to 8pm Saturday and Sunday.
Ummm, from 10am to 9pm you pay MORE than the flat rate. Are you really going to defer all your power usage to outside those times to make this pay off? Really?
But wait, you say! I’ll recharge my car outside those times and it will all work out better for me!
Um, possibly, but probably not. For some time, the CPUC has allowed PG&E to REQUIRE you to switch to schedule E-9 if you have an electric car. Now I note with some dismay that the E-9 schedule declares it is for “Low Emission Vehicles” refueling on your premises (Since when did electric cars stop being ZERO emission vehicles and become LOW emission vehicles?!? That sounds suspiciously like they’re targeting plug-in hybrids!!!).
Let’s look at these beauties:
summer peak 29 cents
summer part peak 11 cents
summer off peak 5 cents
5 cents sounds good, right? Again the devil is in the details. Look at the hours:
Peak 2pm to 9pm M-F
Partial Peak: 7am to 2pm AND 9pm to midnight M-F PLUS 5pm to 9pm on weekends.
Off peak all other hours.
SO, now you’re really hosed if you were trying to power your car with solar panels on your garage. BOTH of your highest performing solar hours are now missing and they drag peak hours out until 9 so you have about 3 hours of zilch production (eg, consumption) at peak rates. Even if you don’t have solar panels (and God help you if you don’t and you’re on E-9) now your rates are incredibly high (almost 3x higher!) for most of the day or about the same as the flat rate just so you can get that 50% off at night!
I read somewhere on the PG&E site that the average customer usage currently is 550kWh/mo. The Volt would max out at about 8kWh*30 days/mo or 240kWh/mo.
Assuming half that 550kWh is used during peak times on E-9 (which seems low to me, but for the sake of argument). Those 275 kWh will cost like they were 825, just to save 120 off your Volt cost.
So, your total bill doubled (825 + the other half, 225), AND you still have to add the cost of the electricity of the Volt (although at half price)! What a deal
We should all be very, very afraid of the Power Companies getting involved with our Volts…
Jul 23rd, 2008 (2:58 am)125 stas Peterson
Ok, I’m no engineer but…well, I think you need to smell a little of what you are shoveling. Also, please proofread what you write, it really does help your argument if you use proper grammar and spell correctly.
Still, I would like to clear a few things up as I hate to see disinformation unchecked.
1) It is called “An Inconvenient Truth” and was a PowerPoint presentation that was made into a film and won him an Academy Award…thats an ‘Oscar’ and they are really hard to get. Vice President Gore went on to share the Nobel Prize for peace as a result of his work to inform the public of the dangers of climate change and what we as individuals can do to combat it.
2) Vice President Gore was a political Science Major at Harvard. His SAT scores were 1355 (625 Verbal, 730 math). He was not an engineer and I was not able to quickly find out his science grades. He did graduate just the same and went on to great things. His attendance at Vanderbilt University Divinity school right after his return from deployment to Vietnam was due to a spiritual need after a particularly draining period in his life. He did not fail nor was his aim to be a “bible thumper” (by the way, religious Christians don’t really like to be called that…FYI), he simply moved on with his life and entered law school. As for failing God….well, Satan did and he is totally kicking it in hell right now. He runs the whole place! And to think that his guidance counselor told him he would never amount to anything.
3) I have heard of Al Gore and “An Inconvenient Truth” but I never heard of this Hungarian guy your talking about. It’s true! I may look him up but I think I’ll just go on with my life.
4) Daddy’s oil millions? Are we talking about the same person? You do know that Al Gore is not G.W. Bush right? Most of the $1.5 – $2.5 million dollars that the Gore’s are worth comes from real estate (farming, mining, etc.) and book deals. He and his wife DO stand to inherit a lot from their parents.
5) You know, I don’t have a good answer as to what to do about irregular patterns of supply and demand across a power grid. I suppose (with my laymen’s understanding) it WOULD be a good idea to hook up to a larger grid so that would make T. Boone Pickens a pretty smart guy. You could also have municipal renewable (solar in this case) power stations that provided local energy at peak times (like solar covering midday) but I really have no idea how you might set that all up. My personal opinion is that we make each household a producer of clean power then we don’t have to worry so much about shifting power from one part of the grid to another for personal demand.
I guess I’ll leave all that to the engineers. Do you guys have a cool secret handshake or something? Just curious if you were like the masons.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (3:17 am)I guess it’s a good thing that GM is collaborating with the utilities, but I am a bit leary of it. I am admittedly ignorant to how all of that will work, but I just have this feeling that this “collaboration” is going to mean the power companies are somehow going to figure out a way to charge us more. I would think that initially, at least for the first few years when production of the Volt is supposedly not going to be that high, that the demand would not over-burden the grid. Am I wrong in thinking that the utilities are going to charge us extra because we have an EV? Or thinking that initially our EV’s won’t overload the grid? Just my thoughts. I hope I am wrong.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (8:40 am)Hi Grump @ 135,
Here is part of what you said: “Van, where are you getting the multiple power generation levels from ? Isn’t the Volt’s generator supposed to run at only ONE speed, one optimized for the Volt’s engine ? Every time I read about the Volt, the “facts” keep changing. I don’t know what to believe, with so many “experts” constantly contradicting each other with the “facts”.
So is the engine to operate at one set speed all the time, or not ?
And I have yet to get a straight answer – Why are all 140 horses needed just to turn the Volt’s generator ? The engine’s job is to spin a generator, not push a whole car down the road.”
Where did I get the three levels? If you look at the “GM CEO CONFIRMS 4-Cylinder 1.4 L Engine Being Considered for Volt’s Range Extender” thread, post #35 by “BillR” it says, “At VoltNation, we learned that the ICE will likely operate at 3 distinct load points….”
Two, I am for sure, not an expert on the Volt design, but I try to keep my comments consistent with what I have read.
Three, so the engine is to operate at one speed or not? I think not. Internal Combustion Engines typically produce more power as their RPM increases, so the three “load points” may be at three different ICE RPM’s.
Four, why are 140 horses needed to turn the Volt’s generator? They are not. First, the turbo 1.4 produces 140 HP, the non-turbo ICE will probably be rated around 100 HP. Second you would need about 70 HP to supply 48 KW of generated power, which the ICE could provide at about 3600 RPM, not so high as to strain the engine even at this peak demand level.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (12:09 pm)#125 stas peterson
“[Al Gore] never succesully completed more than one introductory science course in his entire life…”
I used the scientific method to fact-check your assertion. It is a fact that Al Gore graduated from Harvard with a Bachelor of Arts degree in government cum laude on June 12, 1969. It is a fact that Harvard’s course requirements for a Bachelor of Arts in Government includes more than one introductory science course. Since Al Gore graduated from that program, he must have passed more than one one introductory science course. Unless you can convince me otherwise, I am going to assume that you are wrong about Al Gore. That casts doubt about your other assertions. If you were wrong on one point, it is possible that your other assertions are equally devoid of substance. I’m afraid I view you as an unreliable source of information. You don’t want to be taken as an insubstantial crank, do you?
It takes a decent person to admit when they were wrong. I’m sure you would hate for people to spread lies about you. If they did lie, and were proven wrong, it seems an apology would be appropriate. Do you care to apologize to Al Gore for spreading unsubstantiated gossip and rumors about him?
Let’s stick to facts here. Let’s be civil and respectful, even to those we disagree with.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (12:16 pm)#134 JEC:
Well I for one am not going back. I have lived through the ’73 and ’79 “oil crunches”, and who knows how many similar cycles. As I said the other day, “Fool me once (or twice, or 3 times), shame on you.” “Fool me twice (again), shame on me.”
If the price of oil goes down for awhile, it will only be to set the stage for history to repeat itself. “He who forgets history is doomed to repeat it.”
I am going to get the highest mileage vehicle I can find and drive it for my every day car. I don’t care what the price does. If it goes down, so much the better. If we all drive Volts, maybe we can keep it there.
#137 Arch:
No kidding.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (4:14 pm)Whether you agree with Al Gore or not, he did a service by reminding the public that global warming is an issue. I don’t pretend to know how we got our climate to this point. There are many theories. For me, I will agree with the one that says humans created the climate we are now in or entering into.
So if Al Gore has an agenda, and that agenda is to help us go green, then what harm has he done? I say none.
Let’s not kid ourselves. If we buy the Volt, many of us are doing it because we are tired of paying high gas prices, or tired of supporting terrorism, etc. But no matter the reason, you will still be helping the planet by being greener. No harm, no foul, IMO
I may not agree with his politics, but if he were to become Vice President again on Obama’s ticket, I would seriously consider voting for Obama. At this point, I haven’t made up my mind who to vote for.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (4:24 pm)JEC #134.
Death to Oil.
I don’t care what oil comes down to. I am buying an EV of some sort.
Whether it is the Volt for something else.
I am old enough to remember the gas lines in the early 70′s.
I was too young to drive, but I do not want to go through that.
With my 101 mile daily commute, an EV will help nicely if those gas lines appear again.
I am also strongly opposed to terrorism.
As much as I hate the high price of gas and heating oil, I hope they
stay high or go higher. We absolutely must get off of this stuff.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (5:26 pm)Who is representing the customer in these standard-setting negotiations between GM and the utilities? The utilities want to maximize customer revenues and minimize their own costs. GM wants to be compensated for any costs these standards may entail and is only mildly interested in any after-sale costs that customers may incur due to these standards.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (5:42 pm)NorthernPiker #164.
I’ll say it again.
Unfortunately, the name of the game is: “Screw the consumer”.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (6:48 pm)#137 Arch
#151 Tagamet
#161 noel park
I agree. I’m going out on a limb here; I think the “garbage” increased after the Volt got exposure on Fox News.
#162 Rashiid Amul
I know you tend towards the right of center on many issues. But, I get the impression you have a discerning and inquisitive mind capable of independent thought. I say this WADR; you are either brave or foolish for stating your opinion on Al Gore and climate change. I agree with you on those matters, but have downplayed my beliefs here because of the tendency for crazy “Fox News” types to go ape-kaka (see #125 stas peterson). Be careful. They will call you things like “ecotard” and “liberal.” They will call for you to be burned for fuel. We can get Volt consensus across the political spectrum without using climate change as a motivator.
Please don’t think I am disparaging you. I offer the above as advice. You add a lot of good comments to this blog.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (8:16 pm)The WSJ for 7/22 has an article “GM teams with…” that reports from the conference (among many other things): “At the most basic level, intelligence that will be embedded in the cars in the form of computer chips and software needs to be met with equal intelligence on the utility side. That way, a car that plugs into a garage electric outlet will be recognized as a car by the utility and recharged when it is best for the electric system….”
I do not want a car that charges when the utility decides it is best for the electric system. I want it recharged when it is best for me, the car’s owner. For me, though I hate that it is so, this can be the reason why I never buy a Volt. Basically it introduces a tremendous uncertainty into how much fuel one has in one’s own vehicle.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (9:19 pm)July 23rd, 2008 at 6:48 pm ThombDbhomb
The Fox News Network started reporting on the Volt at VoltNation in NYC. Regardless of your opinion about a particular news source,(you seem very anti-FOX), but there are far too many variables to blame any one source. Personally, I see the upswing as happening closer in time to the BPZ radio show, but I don’t know that that is the source. Temporal contiuguity does not imply cause and effect.
Be well,
Tag
Jul 23rd, 2008 (10:51 pm)#168 Tagamet
I admitted I was out on a limb with that one; it was a WAG. I’m not sure what you guys deemed more “garbage,” but it seems like we are getting more extremist right garbage lately. Something attracted that element. Your appraisal seems fair and balanced; there are far too many variables to blame any one source.
Jul 23rd, 2008 (11:04 pm)Thomb@169
I’m guessing that we are just SUCH a diverse group that shares the single goal of “I don’t want to drive on petroleum”, combined with the fact that we have nothing ELSE to do for the next couple of years, but speculate, that we’re kinda doomed to ramblings. As a shrink, I can at least claim a “professional interest” to reading this blog (wink).
Be well,
Tag
Jul 24th, 2008 (5:30 am)ThombDbhomb # 166. Thanks for the advice. I honestly don’t know if Al Gore is right or wrong. I don’t study climate change and I work in IT.
But if he can help convince people that getting off of oil is a good thing, then I am okay with that.
As far as me being right of center, I have to be honest.
I am really all over the board. It depends on the issue.
I would laugh, though, if someone called me a liberal.
That would be way off. I do lean a little more right than left, as you say.
Jul 24th, 2008 (9:31 am)This is an attempt by GM to get a lot of leverage with the public and the government to promote the Volt. The effect of Volt load on the electric grid will be mighty small for a number of years. However, electric utilities should be licking their chops over the Volt. Electric companies have monthly access to every customer in the USA.
What does GM want from this?
They want free publicity from electric utilities to promote electric cars.
They want pressure from electric utilities on the US government to subsidize the Volt.
They want time-of-day rates from the utilities to encourage off peak charging.
They want help of some kind to get 240volt chargers installed at homes(primarily) and everywhere else. Say hello to a new type of parking meter with a built in charger.
IMHO it’s all good bro.
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