DOE Study: Off-Peak Electricity Production Could Power Most of USA's Vehicles

From The Auto Channel:

RICHLAND, Wash. --– If all the cars and light trucks in the nation switched from oil to electrons, idle capacity in the existing electric power system could generate most of the electricity consumed by plug-in hybrid electric vehicles. A new study for the Department of Energy finds that "off-peak" electricity production and transmission capacity could fuel 84 percent of the country's 220 million vehicles if they were plug-in hybrid electrics.

Researchers at DOE's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory also evaluated the impact of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, or PHEVs, on foreign oil imports, the environment, electric utilities and the consumer.

"This is the first review of what the impacts would be of very high market penetrations of PHEVs, said Eric Lightner, of DOE's Office of Electric Delivery and Energy Reliability. "It's important to have this baseline knowledge as consumers are looking for more efficient vehicles, automakers are evaluating the market for PHEVs and battery manufacturers are working to improve battery life and performance."

More later.

UPDATE: One of our nuclear engineers, Adrian Heymer, sent us the following note:

If the nation moves more toward a plug-in transportation system, which some London stores had in the 1950s and 1960s for delivery vehicles, we would need a lot more baseload generation.

True enough. And more baseload generation means you have just two options: coal or nuclear energy. For more, visit FuturePundit and The Speculist. Thanks to Instapundit for the pointer.

Technorati tags: Energy, Technology, Environment, Electricity, Politics, Electric Vehicles, Hybrid Vehicles