That's right. Here's how it works:
Posted on 11/11/2007 7:54:54 PM PST by T Ruth
Poultney, VT - Imagine collecting a paycheck from your utility company each month simply for plugging your electric vehicle into the power grid and making it available to supply or download power.
"There's a whole new way to look at energy supply and distribution, and our love affair with cars," said Dr. Steven Letendre, professor of management and environmental studies at Green Mountain College. "In the not-so-distant future, electric cars should be viewed both as environmentally-friendly suppliers of services to the power grid and as sources of income for owners."
An article written by Dr. Letendre and Dr. Willett Kempton of the University of Delaware, appearing in the February 15 issue of Public Utilities Fortnightly suggests that this vehicle-to-grid scenario (dubbed "V2G") is not only feasible, but close to reality in some parts of the U.S.
* * *
By the end of this year, the first wave of vehicles able to supply auxiliary power to homes and contractors will hit the market, but with modest modifications, these vehicles also have the potential to "sell" their electricity back to the power grid, increasing reliability and efficiency of the power system and netting a profit for the car owner.
* * *
In the most profitable scenario, the owner charges the vehicle while rates are low and provides services to the grid operators as requested. The study estimates that a properly managed V2G car could net the owner close to $3,000 per year.
* * *
(Excerpt) Read more at greenmtn.edu ...
I think a large part of it comes from charging the vehicle at night when there is excess capacity in the utility's generating system and the cost of electricity is low. Then it may be sold back when the car is parked at work and the grid needs peak power which is expensive.
Looking farther ahead, it could come from fuel cells or other ideas which right now are not economically realistic.
Yup. And people believe that electricity comes from the clouds in the form of thunder storms. Wait until 20,000,000 cars in California are plugged into power grids... Talk about brown-outs!
LOL
I seem to recall discussions in the past about running excess power from home sources back into the grid -- as I recall, the downside was it cut into the power company's profits. I may be misremembering . . .
A. they are from Delaware, Who listens to anyone from Delaware
B. The Guys name is Willet, I think we all can dismiss anything from anyone named... Willett
C. Being a college professor means nothing you say can or has to be challenged you can just vomit anything out of your ivory tower onto the public below. ( I know this because I work among them)
I suppose you could, but the dedicated capital cost may make that idea unprofitable. The apparent attraction of V2G is that it makes use of capital assets which would otherwise be idle: excess night-time generation capacity of the utilities, and excess storage capacity of the vehicles.
Re post #21. The electric company is going to buy back it’s own juice at a loss instead of buying it’s own batteries?
That's right. Here's how it works:
to post 22
there is abundant generating capacity at night,
more than enough for 100 million
electric cars, in the US.
Well, you can see how far our science education has sunk.
The perpetual motion guys are back.
What’s even sadder is that most of the clowns in Congress also believe this is possible.
Plug in at home at night and charge up at low rates.
Plug in at work during the day and sell part of the charge back to the grid at daytime rates.
In theory a vast number of cars out there with a full charge, could supply a great amount of energy redundancy during the day.
The new electric car that has come on the market in the last year that is very expensive, has a range of over 200 miles. If the owner were to sell back 100 miles worth of charge during the daytime, that guy could probably get a pretty exchange rate. I have done this, so I don’t know what the potential is. If this guy is writing about it, there must be some viability to it.
It does seem that if this caught on, at some point the rates in the daytime would somewhat narrow with those at night, as the rates at night would climb and the rates during the day would drop.
Even though the electric utility would buy its own electricity back at a higher price, it is not a loss transaction for the utility. It would only buy back power to meet peak demand, for which its marginal cost is high. It would pay less to buy back stored electricity than it would cost to generate electricity beyond its peak capacity. In effect, the car owner would get paid for storing electricity, and the utility avoids expensive capital costs for capacity that would only be used, say, 5% of the time.
IMHO.......Changes ain’t needed ........paperwork dam of laws is all that’s holding back centuries worth of oil in the CONUS or it’s territorial waters.
I drove the tires off a all electric version of the Pee on us (prius) a few weeks ago and it was nice, cheap and powerful and yes I’d like one..... as my choice . Not something forced upon me and mine by cow crap laws that line some polidiots pockets.
Our nation is in a economic death spiral due it’s loss of cheap energy !
Build the new Refineries and Nuclear power plants NOW !
Stay safe .....Hope yer well !
Should have read, I have NOT done this...
Ooops.
What energy source is used to spin the turbine blades connected to the armature which spins inside magnets producing electricity?
Petroleum, coal, hydroelctric, nuclear? Or we could go with wind and nuclear.
The proposal in the article seems too simplistic.
What was the range on that Prius?
Let’s think about this.
Vehicle to Grid (gasoline powered generator running at night)
Gasoline — $27 per million Btu.
I supply the capital to provide the “power plant” (i.e., the car)
Thermal efficiency — 40%?
Maintenance — $75 - 100/hour at your car dealer
Natural Gas Fired Combined Cycle Central Plant
Natural Gas — $8 per million Btu.
The utility supplies the capital to provide the power plant
Thermal efficiency — 60%
Maintenance — Supplied by utility company. $50/h?
Looks DOA to me.
And what happens when I hop in the EV at 6 PM to go home and find all my juice was sold back to the utility during the daytime and I can’t even make it to the road in front of the office? No thanks. I think I’ll keep my charge to get me home at night.
to 35
I disagree with the concept of V2G,
the estimate for battery life of certain L-I’s
is 3000 cycles.
good enough for a car, but not for
electric-grid load leveling.
I just wanted to point out some illogical
points raised in this thread.
ciao
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