RE:RE:RE:Petro Canada, EV charging stations?meritmat wrote: So my question is who in gods name is our electric grid going to handle all these chargers?
Just got done a couple of power outages last couple days granted they were weather related. Not a lot of fun. Plus last week I believe the Alberta grid sent out notice they were close to there max. Wanted people to cut back on power usage.
Want to see outrage start seeing blackouts in the province. I pity the poor government in charge. (As much as I can ever pity a government)
Great question!!
If people who will be buying EVs charge their cars at night which will most likely be the case for the majority, there is sufficient electrical genetation capacity to meet that demand for the foreseable future.
The problem is that the electrical grid in North America (don't know the situation elsehwere eg Europe) is fundamentally unstable and prone to brownouts and blackouts. Stating the obvious, this is a big problem. What will likely happen in this scenario is that electricity producers will make more money from their installed base as people use more electricity at night while at the same time companies that use a lot of electricity in their production will be vulnerable to service interruptions and peak load pricing (like what you are talking about).
This is why I have invested in companies that produce electricity and some young companies that have solutions to ensuring that companies don't suffer from service interruptions. One of these companies have I have invested in (own about 1% of the company) and related to earlier discussion here, has a technology that has emmisions that are so low that it is exempt from the carbon tax)...a big competitive advantage!!
I expect to make more money going forward from these investments over the longer run than from investments in oil companies. That said, I will invest in oil companies to play shorter term swings as opportunities emerge.