61–70 of 158 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Didn’t congress pass a gargantuan bill a few years back for this?
Yes but that money went to the working groups who need it more than silly bridges.
These are bandaids. Fine in themselves, but not addressing the real problem. The US really need to legalize transmission line construction!
It looks like during last year's heat wave, California FINALLY broke its previous all-time peak load of 50,270mW in 24 July 2006, with a whopping 52,061mW on 6 September 2023. Still, peak usage year over year looks flat to my eyes. I'm sure we can't keep time-shifting and efficiency engineering ourselves out of a fundamental need for more total energy for a huge % of EVs and the push to phase out natural gas, but it…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Didn’t congress pass a gargantuan bill a few years back for this?
Yeah; it's a good start. As per the third paragraph of the article: "In New York, Algonquin Power won a $42.9 million grant to install devices that automatically redeploy power when lines are overloaded. Virginia’s Dominion Energy won $33.7 million for a project that includes devices that will let it adjust power distribution in response to changing conditions on the grid. The funds are part of a $3.5 billion program…
Not just power grid … US infrastructure overall is in need of a “jolt” (updating). Bridges, highways, power grid and more are all aging and in need of massive updating / refresh.
I have 0 faith in our governments to carry out any long-term projects that aren't military-related. Like wasn't a trillion dollar infrastructure bill passed a couple years ago? Where has all that money gone?
Until that happens, EVs will never be useful enough to make ICE cars obsolete.
"It's the infrastructure, stupid".
The US and other countries should have spent those trillions on infrastructure instead of wasting lives and treasure on stupid military adventures. Too late now, the countries are going down the gurgler big time.
The aging power grid is not capable of charging millions of EVs on instant high current demand. Until that happens, EVs will never be useful enough to make ICE cars obsolete. "It's the infrastructure, stupid". The US and other countries should have spent those trillions on infrastructure instead of wasting lives and treasure on stupid military adventures. Too late now, the countries are going down the gurgler big tim…
For some rough math, people drive 10 billion miles per day in the US, and at 3-4 miles per kWh that's an average of 105-140 gigawatts. Average production is half a terawatt, so replacing half the cars on the road might only need 10% more average power production, and almost all of that charging can be done off-peak without an impact on transmission.
In the optimistic case, electric cars can even reduce peak loads on big distribution lines.
It looks like during last year's heat wave, California FINALLY broke its previous all-time peak load of 50,270mW in 24 July 2006, with a whopping 52,061mW on 6 September 2023. Still, peak usage year over year looks flat to my eyes. I'm sure we can't keep time-shifting and efficiency engineering ourselves out of a fundamental need for more total energy for a huge % of EVs and the push to phase out natural gas, but it…
Not just power grid … US infrastructure overall is in need of a “jolt” (updating). Bridges, highways, power grid and more are all aging and in need of massive updating / refresh.
I have 0 faith in our governments to carry out any long-term projects that aren't military-related. Like wasn't a trillion dollar infrastructure bill passed a couple years ago? Where has all that money gone?
It looks like during last year's heat wave, California FINALLY broke its previous all-time peak load of 50,270mW in 24 July 2006, with a whopping 52,061mW on 6 September 2023. Still, peak usage year over year looks flat to my eyes. I'm sure we can't keep time-shifting and efficiency engineering ourselves out of a fundamental need for more total energy for a huge % of EVs and the push to phase out natural gas, but it…