[chiefofgxbxl]

This article is about petroleum-derived products, and cutting your carbon footprint by choosing alternatives.

One thing I can't shake about the EV "revolution" is that it's going to require a massive expansion of our renewable energy capacity, like solar and wind, but we also need that renewable energy for other things, like household energy usage. If we were rational and serious about making the biggest impact, we would reduce car dependency so the green electricity we generate can go to less wasteful means. It seems incredibly wasteful to massively build out green energy to continue to prop up a system where we all drive several-ton hunks of metal one mile to grab a coffee at a drive-thru.

I see stock pictures of traffic jams [0] and just think that EVs are a green "band-aid" to cover up a wasteful lifestyle.

[0] https://media.istockphoto.com/photos/traffic-jam-in-los-ange...

[AnthonyMouse]

> One thing I can't shake about the EV "revolution" is that it's going to require a massive expansion of our renewable energy capacity, like solar and wind, but we also need that renewable energy for other things, like household energy usage.

The big problem we have with renewables right now is matching generation with demand. Solar is really cheap for daytime generation, but what are you going to do at night?

Electric cars don't have that problem. They're parked for most of the day, they need to be charged once a day or less, so they can be charged whenever renewable generation is available. Which makes deployment of renewables more economical, which means we get more of it.

> If we were rational and serious about making the biggest impact, we would reduce car dependency so the green electricity we generate can go to less wasteful means.

We can do two things at once.

The biggest thing we can do to reduce vehicle miles traveled is to relax zoning near urban areas to allow higher density housing to be built closer to jobs. That works, it makes housing more affordable (which is independently good) and people waste less time commuting.

It also takes years before the new housing is actually built and even then doesn't solve the entire problem. You can't replace last mile truck deliveries with higher density housing or mass transit; you need electric trucks. Nobody is going to build low ridership mass transit to the low density suburbs that already exist, and they're not all going to cease to exist.

100% of cars are not going away anytime in the next century, but making the large majority of new cars electric is feasible within the next few years.

This is not a problem with a single solution. It's a problem with 100 solutions that each have a niche and you solve the problem best by deploying them all, each in the place where it makes the most sense.

[KennyBlanken]

The whole "what about at night?!" line has been trotted incessantly out here, slashdot, hackaday, reddit, etc like people in the utility industry aren't aware. A huge amount of electrical load happens during the day that doesn't happen in the dead of the night, which is why many utilities offer nighttime cheaper rates.

That hasn't stopped utilities from deploying wind and solar for 40% of their new generation over the last year or two, while shutting down coal plants left and right. For half a decade it's been considered settled fact that solar and wind are cheapest and the way forward. So, maybe this isn't as big a deal as you think it is.

Attention long ago shifted toward planning the grid to accommodate that, and also on grid-scale storage projects. Pumped hydro has been used extensively in the UK for decades because every time the BBC finished a program, everyone watching TV would fire up their electric kettle at the same time. There are several pumped hydro installations in Canada and the US as well.

Most EVs can schedule charging cycles and numerous utilities provide special rates for customers who agree to some level of utility control on their charging similar to how utilities provide discounts to people who let them tweak their AC thermostat; you can still override it, in most cases. In Australia, going back several decades, there was a grid load reduction signal system that worked by generating a harmonic that load reduction switches would look for.

An increasing number of EVs are set up to be able to backfeed power into the grid, and the idea is that they could do so on request from the utility.

Lots of utilities offer off-peak billing incentives. Imagine a world where your fridge does most of its cooling during the day, and "rides" through the night, etc.

EV charging stations are starting to come with their own local battery systems because DC fast charging, particularly at 800V, is enough power that it can be difficult to get enough electrical service and in some locations the station sits unused for a fair period of time.

Add in the fact that lithium ion battery prices continue to plunge following expected rules about production costs, as well as other technologies maturing; there's an iron salt based flow battery that looks really promising, made of very cheap and extremely prevalent materials (salt, iron, and water mostly) and scales fairly well.

[kspacewalk2]

>That hasn't stopped utilities from deploying wind and solar for 40% of their new generation over the last year or two, while shutting down coal plants left and right. For half a decade it's been considered settled fact that solar and wind are cheapest and the way forward. So, maybe this isn't as big a deal as you think it is.

Conspicuously absent in this incomplete story is the fact that so much of the coal has been replaced by natural gas, which doesn't have the giant unreliability downside of solar and wind. You can get away with >=~40% of your energy generated by solar/wind on every single day of the year with no interruption. Bump that up to 80% and it'll take a long time and a lot of money to accomplish that without sacrificing reliability.

But why? Just use nuclear for the other half. The goal is not "renewable energy ASAP". The goal is "minimize fossil fuel usage ASAP".

[josho]

The problem with nuclear is the long lead time to having a plant up. With delays you can expect a nuclear plant to be online in 15 years.

According to Wikipedia The US has also shutdown a couple nuclear plants because they were cost ineffective.

So the fastest path off fossil fuel are renewables.

[hagbard_c]

Smaller series-built plants will solve the long lead time problem. Once installed these are to be run at max capacity all the time, providing the base load - actually running a nuclear power plant is cheap compared to all other energy sources, the costs are mostly made in the beginning - planning and construction - and end - dismantlement and conservation - of the plant. Those costs - both head and tail - will go down radically with series-built plants. Once a reliable and cheap nuclear or hydro base load is in place the rest can be filled in with a mixture of renewables with storage (which is not available for now except for regions with a large established hydro-power infrastructure), renewables with fossil-based backup or more nuclear capacity. Renewables can not be used on their own as long as the storage problem is not solved, insisting that they can will and does lead to extreme price hikes and brown/blackouts.

I'd be wary of using Wikipedia as a source on this politically contentious issue since it has a known and fairly extreme slant to the "left" on most of these issues, in part due to the Wikipedia "reliable/perennial sources" policy [1] which promotes the use of left-biased sources while demoting centre- or right-biased sources.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Per...

[adrianN]

How many years before those new models are available at scale? Less than 15?

[lttlrck]

It's doubtful the utilities are going to leave money on the table if there is a significant uptick in nighttime electricity usage due to to charging.

I'm not sure I'd want the lifetime of the most expensive component in my car being used to supplement the grid. But not only that, the incentives for feeding power back into the grid are under attack from the utilities:

https://www.theverge.com/2022/1/8/22872236/california-clean-...

[zeristor]

“I'm not sure I'd want the lifetime of the most expensive component in my car being used to supplement the grid.”

I’d imagine that a service like that would be paid for, indeed. Tesla has talked about setting up a system to orchestrate grid support from car batteries and powerwalls.

As I understand it there is more money to be earnt to maintain grid frequency, than to shift load. I guess with more battery storage on the grid the variability in price at higher frequency will calls being made for seconds and minutes will dip.

There’s storage over the day night cycle but earning once a day will take longer to generate income.

But seasonal variability will be generating income a lot more slowly unless the price goes very high, but there would probably be other problems at that point.

[kybernetikos]

> Electric cars don't have that problem.

That's one of the things I'm concerned about - most people want to charge their EVs at night and drive them when there's solar power.

[ulrikrasmussen]

If the workplace has chargers then a large number of cars can also be charged in the 9-5 time span when there is usually plenty of sun. Cars are idle most of the time, so we just have to make sure that they are plugged into the grid whenever they are not being driven, and then have intelligent charging systems that use EVs as sinks when there is a surplus.

[kybernetikos]

It's a nice idea, but for it to work, it's going to need to be cheaper for the end user to charge their car at work than at home overnight (this is unlikely to be true in the near future, although could be made true with the right incentives), and workplaces are going to have to have some incentive to install them.

[AnthonyMouse]

There is probably a tax dodge in there somewhere.

Something like, the employer provides free low speed electric car charging to the public because this is good PR and shows that they're green and encourages customers or clients to hang out on their premises.

But then since it's available to any "members of the public" yet using it involves parking your car at that company's building for eight hours, there is high uptake of the service by employees, and the company is sure to mention their green initiative when recruiting new workers.

[gherkinnn]

Stick a battery in your garage.

[letitbeirie]

That’s expensive, especially on top of a new EV purchase and charger install. How do you avoid a tragedy of the commons without mandating batteries on every new charger installation?

[Retric]

An EV driving 15k miles per year only averages ~500w of electricity 24/7. The infrastructure is therefore relatively cheap.

So at scale a 1GWh battery pack can charge ~100,000 cars at any time of the day. But, assuming PV adoption continues electricity prices will be lower in the day so most people will end up charging at the office.

[letitbeirie]

Two things:

> averages

They average 500W but that's a lot of 0W mixed in with a little bit of 10,000W. If everyone decides they want their 10,000W at the same time it's not going to work out.

> a 1 GWh battery pack

Some day soon. For now though that's about the total installed capacity for the entire USA [0].

[0] https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=40072

[adrianN]

Build some wind turbines then.

[N1H1L]

Trains are amazing for cutting out carbon from the delivery chain. You can even run double stack containers with overhead electrical traction (both China and India do it). Honestly using trucks to ship from a California port to Utah makes no sense - use trains and then transfer to trucks only for the absolute last mile

[zeristor]

There could be issues with capacity, but it would be good.

Tesla trucks whilst nifty have issues, not least the huge road wear from heavy vehicles.

[Matthias247]

> Solar is really cheap for daytime generation, but what are you going to do at night?

Theres batteries for that. And you can even use your EV as an a battery for your solar panels.

[manicdee]

Assuming you are able to plug your EV into a (bidirectional) charger during the day.

[myself248]

It's a false dichotomy. We can BOTH build more green energy, and use some of it to displace fossil fuels from transportation.

If you predicate the future on reducing car dependency, good luck. I mean it's a noble goal, but you're gonna be holding your breath a while. Cars are popular for a lot of reasons.

Likewise trying to build enough solar panels for all the car-miles currently driven ends up being a mountain of solar indeed. So reducing the miles driven would ALSO be nice.

But we have to start on both and push hard on both, because meeting in the middle will happen a lot sooner.

[sofixa]

> Cars are popular for a lot of reasons

Cars can be popular and not be a necessity for the majority of the population, and that will still drastically cut emission, pollution and traffic congestion.

[bellyfullofbac]

> Cars are popular for a lot of reasons.

And so is jetting off somewhere for holidays.. realistically we need to cut down so much to survive, but so far everyone is working on "it's future society's problem".

Only when the threat of death was within weeks did humans actually react with lockdowns, etc...

[mcguire]

It's going to be interesting when we go back to the normal human behavior of dying within 50 miles of where we were born.

I can see a lot of people posting on this forum telling their grandkids, "I actually saw the Eiffel Tower in person, once. Yes, really! There was this thing called 'tourism'."

[ThunderSizzle]

Well, governments quickness to full shutdowns, lockdowns, and travel bans across the world has made international travel much more less likely for myself, which sucks because I would've liked to see the world.

So maybe that's happening more regardless.

[mwint]

Importantly, it’s a band-aid that consumers (especially in the US) can be convinced to want - EVs are fun to drive!

Versus the “right” solution, which is near impossible to sell to the populace.

[JulianMorrison]

EVs are going to drive out gasoline for very comparable reasons to digital cameras driving out film cameras. That's a win for CO2, a win for air pollution in cities (that may be shaving points off people's IQ and definitely is shaving years off their lives), and a win for fungibility of energy generation. As gasoline infrastructure withers, it will be a win for retaining progress; it will no longer be possible to go back.

None of these things end car culture, but switching away from gasoline may help to de-fang it by reducing the macho attraction. If cars become just about getting from A to B, then alternatives may start to look more viable.

[N1H1L]

It's also a win for reducing oil dependency for many nations. Many of the oil producing countries are not always the most savory characters, and energy independence is an important national security goal in itself

[JulianMorrison]

One which can be obtained the good way, or the bad way, yes. EVs will reduce pressure to allow damaging pipelines and shale oil.

[kitsunesoba]

And perhaps more importantly, there isn’t miles of red tape and NIMBYism to overcome to be able to roll out EVs.

I’m strongly in favor of nationwide electric rail, but I also know that accomplishing that will be nearly impossible short of the federal government steamrolling it through, which itself is unlikely due to oil and auto lobbying.

So I see it as a sort of, “take what you can get” situation.

[JulianMorrison]

I could see both those lobbies being much reduced after the EV changeover.

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

I agree, the much better solution would be to reduce the cultural reliance on cars in general. Incentives for more work from home, more walkable and bikeable cities, more amenities locally, better public transport... Unfortunately at least in the US such changes are basically impossible due to the culture, at least currently. A generational die off or two might radically change that.

[dheera]

> EVs are a green "band-aid" to cover up a wasteful lifestyle.

Bad urban planning in the US is arguably a bigger problem. Most people aren't rich enough to live within walkable distance of their nearest coffee shop, grocery store, and train station. Trains make you wait an hour outside in the cold wet rain without bathrooms while a mentally ill person harrasses you for half of the hour. Buses don't show up. Curb ramps don't have drainage, so you have wet socks. And the nearest actual bathroom is for "customers only" (at least for males).

So people drive. It's unfortunate.

[coffeefirst]

Right. Oddly this is where our climate problems can meet our affordable housing problems: start building clusters of neighborhoods that are designed to be walkable and bikeable. These are in stupidly high demand, we just need more of them. Default to installing heat pumps, solar panels, and EV hookups.

There's no silver bullets, but if the average person winds up driving X% fewer miles because they have the option to walk, that's a meaningful win.

[thatfrenchguy]

Retrofitting the massive suburbs in both Europe and the United States is an almost impossible undertaking though. Likely the market will speak at some point and oil / electricity will become too expensive for people to own houses in the suburbs, but it’ll be painful when so much of the suburbanites identity is tied around this false idea of being “left alone”.

That, and the majority of Americans don’t even walk anymore, you can spend hours of driving without seeing someone walking to somewhere (as opposed to walking their dog), it’s insane.

[sofixa]

> Retrofitting the massive suburbs in both Europe and the United States is an almost impossible undertaking though

Europe where? Suburbs are mostly an American thing, and the closest equivalents in most European cities are dense-ish, and usually have some form of public transit connection. Many cases can be improved a lot, but it isn't even close to being comparable to the thoroughly unsustainable very low density American sprawl.

[dagmx]

I think it needs to be solved in multiple ways.

Reduce the need for cars which will reduce the load on the grid if they're driven less.

But move people to buy EV cars instead of ICE where they can't do away with having a car.

Even if that still uses dirty energy sources, it's still cleaner than having ICE cars driving everywhere with their little inefficient engines, when a big power plant can do much more to be efficient. It also decouples energy sources in such a way that green energy can be built up to replace it without consumer disruption.

It's a win win to move people to EVs, but it's not the only end goal for better climate policy

[ya_throw]

>If we were rational and serious about making the biggest impact, we would reduce car dependency

I've spoken to a subset of EV proponents who would strongly disagree with this. They say that it's not feasible or even possible, or maybe even acceptable, to convince enough people to change their lifestyle this radically. Therefore, we need to just all buy EVs.

Personally I agree with you, although the huge boost that continuing new development gives to my field as an engineer is undeniable.

[ZeroGravitas]

If HN had a vote option that represented "I mostly agree with what you've written, but worry you're only saying it as half-garbled talking point designed to oppose something else that I support" it would get a lot of use from me.

I applaud your support of walkable cities with robust public transportation infrastructure.

I'm sad that it seems to mostly just be an echo of a decades long misinformation campaign against EVs rather than a positive and sincere suggestion to improve society.

The phrase "if we were rational and serious" is a red flag. Rarely has that come up in climate change discussions without a whole bunch of (ironically) irrational assumptions attached to it.

Oh if only those silly greens had been more rational! What amazing progress we could have made on this problem. Are we all supposed to pretend that lots of serious (acting) figures on the, let's say, non-green side didn't openly and blatantly lie about it not being a problem and all the solutions being cons long after everyone knew this was what they were doing?

If I was to come up with a list of things that were not rational or serious "pretend climate change is not happening" would come way before "let's stop using internal combustion engines in crowded cities because we have cheaper, better, quieter, healthier alternatives readily available".

[xapata]

Progress is better than design paralysis.

[mkoubaa]

People want to drive one mile for coffee and there is nothing you or any government can do about it. It's th unfortunate truth

[option]

We need more nuclear

[xwdv]

This is the only solution I accept these days in any serious discussion about cutting carbon emissions. And yea I know about Chernobyl and Fuckushima, but we’re still better off dealing with focused problems like that instead of vague extinction level crisis.

[option]

Yeah, I know about Chernobyl too - I grew up there and my parents still work there (since 1987). Yes, it was a huge tragedy but it’s effects are hugely exaggerated by oil and gas lobbyists in US.

[homo_nullius]

The bigger problem with EV revolution is carbon footprint of its side effects, e.g., extra emissions from producing and utilizing batteries, or extra particulates from tire wear due to weight of electric vehicles.

[rcMgD2BwE72F]

Please explain why a Tesla Model 3 is negligibly heavier than a BMW 3 series.

[homo_nullius]

Explain why it's heavier? Because electric vehicles carry all the chemistry, while gasoline powered vehicles only carry carbon and hydrogen and take oxygen from the air.

Or explain why the difference in weight is negligible? But it's not, electric vehicles are noticeably heavier, and vehicle weight is the primary driver of tire wear and road wear.

[loudtieblahblah]

The problem is made harder by the fact dense populations of humans sucks.

It increases aggressive, conflict and indifference to other people. Crime is always higher. Dealing with infectous disease is harder.

You'd never convince me to live in a city. Especially while rearing a child. The coffee shop will always be a mile if not 5 or 10 from me.