EV alternative for light/medium duty trucks

RoyJ wrote:

Reisender wrote:
The BC hydro website digs into this a bit. Essentially the province doesn’t have a problem with generating capacity. But distribution and grid will adapt in the normal course of maintenance and up keep going forward to adapt to the changing load in neighborhoods etc.

Nailed it. Gen capacity is not (too much of) an issue in BC, especially once Site C comes online. We're at around 2,000 MW remaining capacity at peak usage, simplified math says 330,000 6kW home slow chargers. If charged overnight then virtually unlimited.

But we have a lot of neighborhoods still fed by single phase 12kV lines, and older substations are tapped out. Upgrading the entire province to 25kV will take a long time (took 5 years just to get rid of the last 3 4kV substations).

I fully support a 2-tier rate system with cheaper off-peak hours. However, if that means higher peak hour rates, then non-EV owners won't be happy.

Yah. This is Revelstoke Dam. Maybe 100 kilometres from our house. We like camping in the area. Notice the missing 6th tube. Lots of capacity left. There are a few dams like this in BC. And at least one more dam coming on line in the next few years. BC hydro is not worried about capacity.





But neighbourhood distribution will be an ongoing upgrade over the next 30 to 40 years. We have 47 town houses in our development. All with 100 Kw service. I think there are 5 of us with EV’s (one may be a PHEV). I think we are all using 32 amp 240 volt EVSE’s although I think the PHEV is just a standard 120 volt 12 amp. We also have a second 12 amp 240 volt unit outside from when we had two vehicles. A little slower but still fine for most days.

Anyway, as BC hydro indicates on their website, there is no real upgrade project, but distribution upgrades will be done in the course of normal maintenance.

Cheers.