[bowow]

If everyone uses resistive heat during that 1% of the time that it's -20F or below, the electric grid goes down and then no one gets heat. Consider what just happened in the southeast with TVA and rolling blackouts. That was precisely because it was too cold for heat pumps and so everyone's resistive heat engaged at the same time. I don't think your EV range comparison is a particularly good one. You can control your stops on a road trip, you can't control when it's colder than -20F outside.

[ledauphin]

If they can manage the grid granularly enough and isolate critical environments like hospitals, nursing homes, etc., I really don't see a good reason for us to overbuild to handle the third standard deviation of electricity demand. It makes a lot more sense to set the expectation that on the coldest days of the year, your house may spend a few hours disconnected from the grid in order to shed load. Not only does the avoid overbuilding, but it also contributes to less overall fragility in society, because black swan events that happen once every 50 or 100 years are the sorts of things we can't build for anyway, so it's better if people are prepared to endure the unexpected from time to time anyway.