Why plugging in all those EVs could actually save the power grid

Filed 1w ago · Via Grist · The Buffoon Desk

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Hillbilly Swing

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

Photo: European Parliament · CC BY 2.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

A report from Kevala, GridLab, and E3 finds that if just 10% of California's EV owners enrolled in vehicle-to-grid programs by 2036, they could supply a third of the state's targeted long-duration energy storage. California's battery storage capacity has already grown 2,100% since 2019 to cope with solar and wind intermittency.

The pitch is that idle EVs, already plugged in at homes and offices, could discharge power during peak demand instead of utilities building expensive new battery farms. Paired with demand-response measures like remotely adjusted smart thermostats, the report argues this could blunt the late-afternoon demand spikes driven by AC use and data centers.

The unresolved question is compensation: pay EV owners too little and nobody enrolls, pay too much and it costs more than just building the batteries. Report authors say owners could specify when they need a full charge, so nobody wakes up stranded.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

Everybody wins is doing a lot of work in that sentence, given the actual plan is still just a report proposing an incentive structure nobody has designed yet. Ask again once the rate cases get filed and see whose bill actually goes down.

Source: Read the original at Grist → Scored: Hillbilly Swing · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0

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