like a cheeky one heat wave Boiling the West in the run-up to Labor Day, California’s power grid operator is calling on electric vehicle owners to avoid peak-hour charging. The request is part of a wider effort to keep the state’s electrical grid running as locals turn on their air conditioners to survive a series of scorching hot days.
By at least September 2ndthe California Independent System Operator (CAISO) asks residents to save energy by “turning thermostats to 78 degrees or higher, health permitting, avoiding large appliances and turning off unnecessary lights” from 4 to 9 p.m. hours Pacific. “They should also avoid charging electric vehicles during that period,” added the . please non-profit organization that oversees the California grid and energy market.
CAISO warned in a separate comment that in response to three-digit forecasts, it could make further calls to protect electricity “through the Labor Day weekend.” The warning came when Governor Gavin Newsom emergency proclamation to increase energy production in the state.
Rising temperatures and conservation calls come as California’s Air Resources Board clears the way to ban the sale of new gasoline-powered passenger cars. The gradual regulation won’t take full effect for more than 12 years, but it raised questions about whether the state’s electrical grid can reliably power millions of additional EVs by then, given California’s recent history of summer blackouts.
The clock is ticking, but regulation is seen by climate experts as a critical step for California, and the other states that follow suit, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause heat waves. worse and more often. More than half of gas and light truck passenger cars US transportation emissionsaccording to the Environmental Protection Agency.
“It’s pretty aggressive for the fifth largest economy to declare something like that by 2035,” Dr. William Collins, the director of Berkeley Lab’s Climate and Ecosystem Sciences Division and Carbon Negative Initiative, told londonbusinessblog.com after the board approved the regulation.
dr. Anne Lusk, a researcher and a lecturer at Harvard’s School of Public Health, also said the timing was right in a conversation this week with londonbusinessblog.com.
“On the issue of air pollution from mobile sources, we need the policy immediately,” she said. But due to other issues such as range anxiety and income inequality, “I think 2035 is good,” she clarified, citing the time it takes automakers to release more affordable EVs, for more used EVs to reach secondary markets, and for the US to go ashore to build up its charging infrastructure.
Up to that point: A recent JD Power survey revealed poorly maintained chargers and high prices as two major obstacles to EV adoption.
Meanwhile, it’s sweltering hot and just gets hotter. California maintains a list of: cooling centers and tips for residents suffering from extreme heat, the deadliest form of extreme weather in the US, according to the National Weather Service.