In 2016, the U.S. Air Force offered a vision of the future for the transportation and energy sectors when the Los Angeles Air Force Base became the first federal facility to replace its entire ground vehicle fleet with plug-in electric vehicles (EVs). More consequentially, their EVs became the first in California to provide vehicle-to-grid (V2G) services, where the batteries in electric vehicles can send energy back to the grid, enabling cleaner, more efficient, more reliable power. As millions of Californians face repeated blackouts to avert wildfires or because of them, the state should follow the military’s lead and develop ways for its growing fleet of EVs to ensure resilient power to communities and critical facilities – especially during outages.
A typical electric car has a battery that can hold about 60 kilowatt hours (kWh) of energy, enough to provide back-up power to an average U.S. household for two days. California-based electric bus manufacturer Proterra offers it Catalyst E2 Max model with a 660 kWh battery. That’s enough to keep power on in shelters, emergency response centers or other key areas of need during a disaster. As California continues its progress towards mass adoption of EVs, the energy storage potential of these vehicles becomes even more profound. If the state meets its goal of having 5 million EVs on the road in California by 2030, they would possess approximately 250 million kWh of energy storage, enough to provide back-up power to all of San Francisco for about 14 days.
An Advantage During Emergencies
Many solutions will be needed to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires sparked by high winds blowing vegetation into electric lines and intensified by the effects of climate change. Trimming trees, burying power lines underground, and relying more heavily on solar powered microgrids that can operate independently during disruptions will all be part of the mix. The opportunity to use the energy storage capacity of EVs has received less attention. That should change. While the obvious fact that EVs are mobile makes it more challenging to use them for grid services compared to stationary batteries during normal grid operations, this becomes an advantage during emergencies.