You don't even need to do that. Most re-charging of plug-in hybrid vehicles would occur at night. They do not turn off power plants at night. All of that capacity is available and currently is cheaper. If a large % of the population was charging their vehicle at night, that would actually be a much more efficient use of power plants assets.

I think you're right. But the way it works now, nuclear is run 90% of the time, ie it generates 90% of its total power capacity. Coal is run almost all the time too. Coal and nuclear with high plant costs and low fuel costs (nuclear is almost free) are perfect for "baseload".

There are also peaking plants (mostly gas) that run during the high demand periods of the day.

Basically though if you increased demand a lot at night...you'd probably still need more power plants. The ratio of nighttime demand to daytime demand is about 1:2. The spare capacity is all natural gas which a) is running out and b) is more expensive than nuclear on a 24 hour basis.

Any new information about converting coal to hydrocarbon liquids?

I don't know if there's anything "new" about it.

The process was invented by Nazi Germany during WWII as they didn't have enough oil. So it's been around a while.

Look on the internet for "coal to oil". A ton of coal has from 15-30 GJ of energy (one kwh is 3.6M J of energy) and a barrel of oil has about 6.1 GJ of energy. The process is relatively efficient and if you add hydrogen to the mix, then you get a higher yield. But I'm no expert.

The process was invented by Friedrich Bergius in 1913, and of course he was not a Nazi (the Nazi came about 1930) but he won a NOBEL PRIZE!
A friend of mine, a chemist, mentioned me this Bergius process just today talking of peak oil. To this friend, there will be no peak oil problem thanks to the Bergius process, which was abandoned because it's a bit more expensive than the cheap oil. Of course there will be a Peak Coal, but it's decades away.
He states there's no pollution problem... but this I have not checked yet.

ooohh.

Now I didn't know those things. New leads to explore. Thanks!

and where do we come up with the additional fuel to do so?

Nuclear is on all the time as base load. Even at night. Same amount of uranium is used all the time. So charging your plug-in hybrid vehicle at night doesn't use any extra fuel. Most utilities charge less at night because they have so much power that is being wasted during those hours.

Wind is even better. It will run all night without any extra fuel costs.

Coal is a very cheap base load fuel. $35 to $45 per ton. We can run on that for 200 years.

Nuclear and coal are already about 70% of US electric power. Wind will likely fill the gap as natural gas supplies decline. With the way wind is growing it will likely be providing a significant portion of our power well before natural gas peaks. Wind is running well ahead of all projects made in past years.

I really see no problem with the PHEV concept and charging at night. Most of the studies done anticipate that a 20 to 60 mile range from pure battery is possible with current battery technology. They just need to alter the ratios of battery to engine (more battery, less engine) and make the battery rechargeable.

It is already being done in California with current cars. Total cost is about $1,000 more than the current hybrids that are for sale.

http://www.calcars.org/vehicles.html

And it is already spoken for, peaking is done by plants that can tolerate load transients, these are NG fired, not coal or nuclear, at least from what I have seen.
You seem to be trying to forget physics, if your source is steady, and the load is decreased, the generator increases speed, and loses sync with the rest of the grid, then trips off. remember how long it took to restore power to the north east after last summers blackout (baseload plants do not do well under transient conditions)


Agreed, fuel costs for wind are quite minimal!, scaling of wind is somewhat of a problem (in regards to integration with the rest of the grid) but the problem is getting enough to make a significant difference.


At current consumption rates. What about increased generation as gas peaks, for the coal to syn gas projects?
At current rates of increasing consumption, it lasts about 95 more years, Hubbert will arrive in how long?


Except NG, and Wind is at a standstill since the gov let the PTC expire, but wind is currently competitive with the cost of fuel for NG fired plants, and with regard to the near future, will be cheaper than the cost of NG. So wind can and will grow, but the question is:
Can it grow fast enough?



Yes, the trend will go toward smaller and smaller engines, with the torque capability (thus acceleration) of the machines being a figure of merit.

Check out page 16 of this link. It has a graph that shows how fast wind is growing compared to all projections. In 2004 we have already reached the worldwide wind MW goal that the IEA estimated for 2020.

The IEA made that estimate in 1998 of 45 GW (45,000 MW) by 2020.
The target was reached 16 years early. Largely on just the output of Germany and Denmark. The sheer potential of wind is just staggering.

http://www.rechsteiner-basel.ch/pub/29/Ten%20steps.pdf
(see page 16 for the relevant graph)

I wrote a nice post estimating that if you were to replace 3 billion barrels of oil with their energy (to wheels) equivalent it would require doubling the nuclear capacity in this coutnry from 100,000MW to 200,000MW. It didn't go through though.

Of course the recharging would still be a little lumpy so this additional 100,000MW demand wouldn't be even.

Basically 3 billion barrels * 42 gallons * 36 kwh/gallon * 1/6 (efficiency of engine) = 800 billion kwh. It would take 100,000MW steady to provide this.

Also, about wind energy. It's great that it's expanding, but the problem with it is that it's intermittent. If wind is concentrated mostly in the Mid-West, where it'd probably be cheapest to build, what do you do in summertime when the wind dies down? You need backup power and that backup power is expensive. Most of the cost of a coal or nuclear plant is not in the fuel, it's in the plant. Gas plants are cheaper capacity wise and more expensive fuel wise...so they'd be a better choice, that is if gas weren't running out.

This is why people often say wind will only be at most 20% of production.

We have already went on a NG fired plant building binge (95% of plants built w/in last 5 years have been NG fired) so the "backup" is already in place.


I've seen numbers that suggest that very little (aditional) investment is required for updating the grid for wind energy supplying up to 20% of the electrical energy used. After that percentage, many new lines and upgrades are required.

It's lucky that the wind blows reliably 100% of the time. If it was intermittent we'd really be in trouble.

In regards to the future, I'll take any energy that may be available, how about you?