Featured VW ID.4 with 3 years free charging

Not too sure of what?

Powerwall customers can charge when power is out, either through whole home back up or plugging in at slower level one charge on a partial home backup circuit.

To be clear, not asserting most BEV drivers have home battery backup at this time. Rather making the point that a significant percent of those who have solar/battery backup have a BEV and that they are more “in luck” during power outages than ICE drivers.

 

They need to be more lucky in a power outage, because the amount of time sitting charging at home is significantly longer than the time at the pump. The two most recent power outages were scheduled for us. We were warned about it beforehand. I can use my portable gas containers in an emergency situation they currently have 7 gallons of gas, (one 5 and one 2 gallon). Cost was miniscule compared to battery backup. I do have a back up generator but have to run extension cords which is a pain as it runs on gas.

Now Tesla has no tax credit which I honestly didn't account for when my wife made the reservation, and her income level excludes her from the CA rebate. No free supercharging....

moto g(7) power ?

 

valid? as when a hydrogen electric compressor goes down for hydrogen pressurization? as when hydrogen reformation stops when grids go down? as when the pumps go down at the gas station? or when the grid's EV chargers go down at home & businesses? then yes .... power goes down. So .... your point is?
After all - with least costly residential power backup, being batteries, coupled with (for example) our 7KVA Honda inverter generator - (mod'ed to run on 3 fuels, either our 200 lb propane tank, nat gas or our 4 regularly rotated gasoline jerry cans.) Your level of preparedness/resiliency may differ.
One thing that DOES differ is, there is little to no resiliency incorporated into hydrogen refueling - and none that's as simple as methods to make due when the grid dumps & you need to bev rwcharge.

We've done several combinations of plugins and BEV's. With just the leaf, we would have as high as $200 surplus (after home's refrigerators EV, central air, lights Etc). Most of Cali runs on muli-tiered electricity, so over-generation is the smallest yield, unless we over-generate past tier 1 into tier 2 above 600kwh, and that's very rare. Best to use that cheap juice, rather than being forced to get a paltry 20¢/per kWh credit for Edison to resell it at >35¢/per kwh.
With battery backup, when the grid goes down, you don't go "anti-island" solar shut down so as not to electrocute a lineman working to restore power. Instead your system stays up - its an independent island. That's another great way to be resilient. That works for plug-ins. Hydrogen? Not so much. It could, if they had the good sense to make them plug-in, but that would make their already hideously/overly expensive cars even more astronomically overpriced.

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Disagree. Even if a gasoline station has backup power, it takes longer.

In an unplanned power outage, time at the pump is infinite if no power to pump gas. If the gas station does have backup power, there will likely be much more congestion as drivers rush to fill up. With battery backup/solar there is no time sitting around as one can charge similarly to no power outage - plug in and go inside, no need to hang around your vehicle.

In a planned power outage, as most of these are, one just charges to full ahead of time. Easy to fill to full overnight with level 2. Takes seconds of time with a BEV with planned or unplanned outages, many minutes to never with ICE.

That scenario takes more time than BEV charging. Just charge up to full on a BEV ahead of the planned power outage. Tesla sends alerts in these cases and no battery backup needed in that scenario.

 

yes some states mandate backup power, While others leave it to the varying companies, meaning that many do not have backup power.

Back-up Power for Gas Stations
This is the case with most stations in California, where most of the drivers do their driving
Some scenarios cause 4 to 6 hours of waiting time just to get to that poor slob who had the foresight to run their gas station with backup power
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I've heard sometimes the hydrogen stations are out of hydrogen. (I don't think anyone mentioned that caveat)...

But like I mentioned, I can easily and more cost effectively store gas in portable gas containers, vs storing electrons. Fill the gas tank before the power outage makes filling the BEV before a power outage a moot point, even easier to plan because significantly less time to fill. My point was having the portable tanks vs battery backup for emergency cases....

But back to the iD.4 I don't see another company making a 7 seater BEV so every time we compare the 7 seat Y vs something else that always sits badly towards the competition. Wife said she spent a lot of time looking at Volvo due to Costco special...

moto g(7) power ?

 

How is filling a gas can easier or faster than the less work and less time (seconds) to plug-in at home with battery back up/solar?

As for costs, those don’t account for externalities which make internal combustion more expensive. Someone always pays the price, even if the individual does not.

 

the one bad thing about gas storage, is you need to regularly rotate it. Even with stabilizer, you store it too long? It turns to a sort of varnish, which causes the engine to sputter if it runs at all. Found that out the hard way. That meant we had to start rotating the fuel into the plug-in Chrysler Pacifica, which BTW is a 7-seater. Even the Honda inverter, had to take apart and boil out the carburetor that was gummed up due to old gas. Now, a lesson learned, all of the gas, even the bowl of the carburetor is dried out before it goes into storage.

did she check out the plug-in Pacifica? We were Blown Away about all the cool fancy features as well as utility when you have all the seats either removed or below the floor.



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As already stated, you make sure the BEV is charged before hand. It's no different than making sure you have gas for your generator beforehand.

Most people getting a Powerwall aren't getting for back up. it is for how Tesla mostly markets it; shifting solar production to time of use. Normally, most houses were empty during the day. So most production was during a low period in the home's energy demand. The battery lets the family use that 'free' energy when they are actually home. Power back up is just an added benefit.

Agree for areas where power outages of extended periods are expected. They weren't in NJ when Sandy hit. Some did have generators, They could have been contracted for supplying first responders, or the responder fleet had a private station with power.

As for hydrogen stations, it takes a lot of energy for those fast fills. I expect back up power not to be sized for that, and their will be longer fill times during an outage, and that will be the case of one running of a generator sized for a gas station.

Can also happen to gasoline and diesel stations. None are immune to a disruption in the supply, or a run on the local station. Hydrogen is just less robust in comparison.

Well, 7 seats in SUVs of the ID4 and Model Y size have fallen out of favor in the US. Toyota did stop offering it in the Rav4, and didn't offer the third row Prius v here. The third row was too tight and/or you lost a lot of cargo space. It would be easier to fit in a BEV, but it sounds like VW opted to give the rear passengers in an ID4 the space of the rear seat from a SUV one size up. Sounds like they will have a Tiguan sized BEV that will have the third row.

The Model Y might be bigger than the ID4, but both sites are horrible in not having a specs page for the car with all the basic stats.

 

Being fair lets compare apples to apples, I can keep those portable gas containers to refill my tank, and put them in the trunk, to fill the car. I can leave them at home....

My friend's wife is a realtor and her office I believe is far in Newport Beach so she drives a lot daily. So you're saying just plug in and recharge prior to the power outage? Not so easy vs filling at the gas station. That was my point. And keeping extra electricity is not feasible like the portable tank in the trunk.

The challenge is and always will be storage. Even fully depleted the battery weighs A LOT, whereas the gas is GONE and weighs nothing.

Breakdowns have been challenging for Tesla owners after the warranty is up. (But nice to know they sell their service info for $100/day I like to service myself)...

moto g(7) power ?

 

As noted, takes a BEV a few seconds to fill up the night before. We have the shortest range Tesla, a mere 240mi EPA ready, fully charged, and 150mi EPA Leaf for a planned power outage, should that happen. That’s way faster than any ICE scenario, including smelly gasoline cans in the trunk. 240mi easily gets to another place to charge in the rare emergency.

If backup energy edge cases were important enough, we would get home battery backup. Much of this would be paid for from peak shaving on TOU plans. With a properly sized solar/battery system one has a near limitless supply of backup energy. And this adds no weight whatsoever to the vehicle, even before it is used.

Regardless, already the time we spent not having ICE has saved us dozens of hours of not playing with gasoline pumps anymore. Should we never get home battery backup and some day have to drive 2-20 miles to a supercharging or L2 station for an emergency charge, that’s still a lot of time saved compared to ICE.

 

It also means dealing the potential issues from fumes and spills.

And how long will those 7 gallons last? My coworker had no electricity for a week after Sandy. They were on the edge of the black out zone, so getting gasoline for a generator wasn't much of a problem for them, but it was for many others.

First of all, I think many here would say a BEV may not be the best choice for someone that has a commute of over a hundred miles. Specially if they might also be driving often during the day. It can work, but the individual has to consider edge cases, and decide how comfortable they are with just a BEV and them.

The point was that a scheduled outage means that you can prepare for it. Part of that preparing is in choosing a car that you can prepare for them, if it is needed. Three years for free fast charging could be enough prep for some people.

An unscheduled outage could also happen when those tanks aren't filled, and your car is also low on fuel.

It isn't gone. It is now mostly water and carbon dioxide that you just threw out into the environment. Plus some other, more directly harmful emissions that will be higher when the gas is burned in a portable generator.

You've merely traded the cost of carrying around weight for other costs.

 

Battery backup - for some home users, has even turned into a profit center, to the chagrin of some of the utilities. You store your free PV power to your battery backup .... during expensive daytime TOU - for your cheap night time power use ... then daytime let your excess PV power be drawn back onto the grid, where they have to credit you at the higher day-time premium. The utility cries about having to periodically add (generation plants) to the grid ... then they try to stop residential sources from supplying them with cheap/clean power.
oh the irony.
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I'm surprised to read that the utilities try to prevent home owners from getting solar? For us it is kind of a rip off. That four or five hundred dollar credit translated to a $1xx check in the mail, I believe less than $150 if I recall correctly. We'll see this year but they do not compensate at the rates they charge the consumer, they only credit that amount towards future use. So I guess in that respect they discourage overproduction. Our cheapest monthly bill is when we use a tiny bit more than we produce. It actually drops lower than the service connect fee we get charged if we overproduce....

We can go back and forth about the pros and cons of each, whether gas or electric... Last time I checked our electricity is not produced entirely from green sources, as of just a few minutes ago from my ISO Today app shows 18% is from green energy. So we convince a whole bunch of people to go BEV. We are going green 18% of that energy because some sort of carbon fuel is burned to make up for the 82% remaining...





moto g(7) power ?

 

CAISO is CA wide average. Within CAISO are functionally independent grids such as PG&E here from which >85% is fossil fuel free delivered to customers. So for solar PV customers, even higher.



Clean energy solutions

 

This is a pretty inaccurate representation of CAISO. That point in the evening when the sun has just set from when you took this snapshot has the lowest renewable energy percent as solar has just stopped generating and demand is the highest.

Also the BEV argument here doesn’t hold any water. On a time of use plan you would never want to charge routinely then as the utility would punish you for that ($$$) and rightly so. No reason to not charge during off peak when demand is lower and renewable energy represents a higher percent. Better yet, if this is a real concern to someone - charge during the day when you are over generating solar PV and you guarantee yourself 100% renewable energy regardless of what grid you’re connected to.

 

It's Sunday, not a weekday, and not sunny today. I can take a snapshot tomorrow any time of your choice just let me know. I think the maximum I've seen as 30 %. We charge after 10 pm. I did not suggest to charge during the day. I just noticed that when usage $ wise was slightly above production $ we'd get a bill for use but not for interconnect fee so it would be lower. I did not mention anything about when to charge anytime except after 10 pm.

Also, we are talking about buying a BEV, not BEV plus solar. I don't know the percentage of households that have solar, but I would guess less than 50%. If you increase BEV sales without solar sales, how would that percentage shift. Extra energy needed would come from carbon because renewable sources already maxed out...

moto g(7) power ?

 

So much stuff utterly wrong here, lets just take a few:

Irrelevant (wrong to imply demand wasn't highest exactly when you sent your screenshot), irrelevant (same) and just wrong (just because it might not have been sunny where you were...). As below, you posted your data precisely within minutes of the highest demand today. And today was plenty sunny.

Best to let others who have been following CAISO for years and are familiar with all the daily and seasonal trends by source and demand.

Since you show little knowledge of CAISO, that is possible but ill advised to suggest you are knowledgeable on that subject. Another bit of sleight of hand on your part, but we were talking about renewables, not just solar.

If you had been following CAISO for years you would know this is completely false including just today. Care to tell us what the maximum for renewables today is? In the spring, even higher.

 

Yes not knowledgeable much but searching online 2019 saw an increase in use of carbon based fuel to produce electricity (EDIT- here in CA)...

You can say I'm wrong all you like but the problem is still storage. The answer no matter how you distract others with my incorrectness is not BEV, not BEV + solar, but BEV + solar + battery backup. Otherwise you are not going green they will have to turn on their burners for everyone to charge at night when it's cheapest and when most people do at home because they drove to work. When people aren't home with their BEV they either charge at work or at home at night. And just because they aren't home doesn't mean they aren't using electricity at work.

So to go green means to increase renewable use to 100%, plus storage so it can be used at night.

And yes solar breaks down, if you didn't hire a company who honors their required by law warranty, then you have to find and pay someone to come repair it like I did...

moto g(7) power ?