Support the EPA in limiting greenhouse gases

Tell the EPA You Support Its Efforts to Curb Carbon Pollution!

action.sierraclub.org

The EPA has proposed New Source Pollution Standards for power plants and refineries to limit the amount of global warming pollution they can spew into our air. Tell the EPA your support their proposal to protect us from the effects of climate change.

Volt news

GM has plans to continue building on the Volt’s  momentum. In addition to new plans to build 25,000 Volts this year and up to 120,000 next year, the Volt team is highly focused on reducing costs.  After all with demand at $41,000 it is certain more would be sold a a lower price point.  GM CEO Dan Akerson has charged his team with taking at least $7500 in cost out of the car by its next generation. With the federal tax credit still in place that would put the car well below $30,000 and in the reach of a far greater amount of people.

--from the volt website

Talking with the neighbors

We invited some friends and neighbors over this weekend to talk about the solar panels and test drive the Volt.  We had about 15 people stop by.  Hopefully this sort of word of mouth event will help build buzz and momentum for solar panels and electric cars so that they are not just a novelty.   We hope that as more people buy electric cars and install solar panels we can become part of a strong constituency that can lobby for more support for renewable energy, electric cars, and plug-in stations and at the same time stop the subsidies for oil, gas, and coal.  Speaking of which, here is a graphic showing how much our federal priorities need to be reversed from supporting deadly fossil fuels to life affirming renewable energy.  For starters, we need to vote out any congressperson who denies global warming--i.e. the Koch Industries Tea Party zealots.

A study released by the Environmental Law Institute, a nonpartisan research and policy organization, shows that the federal government has provided substantially larger subsidies to fossil fuels than to renewables. Subsidies to fossil fuels totaled approximately $72 billion over the seven-year study period, while subsidies for renewable fuels totaled $29 billion over the same period. e vast majority of subsidies support energy sources that emit high levels of greenhouse gases when used as fuel. Moreover, just a handful of tax breaks make up the largest portion of subsidies for fossil fuels, with the most significant of these, the Foreign Tax Credit, supporting the overseas production of oil. More than half of the subsidies for renewables are attributable to corn-based ethanol, the use of which, while decreasing American reliance on foreign oil, has generated concern about climate effects.ese figures raise the question of whether scarce government funds might be better allocated to move the United States towards a low-carbon economy.

For press inquiries contact Brett Kitchen at 202-939-3833. Full report text and pdf of this graphic may be found online at:

http://www.eli.org/pressdetail.cfm?ID=205 ©Environmental Law Institute.

Smart meter correction

I had thought that we were using a smart meter with the PG&E E9 rates, but I was wrong.  I just learned that the E9 meter, which runs backwards with solar panels, is not a smart meter.  PG&E has to come out to read it every month, which is why they tack on a meter charge for its use.  In fact this is the case for all Time of Use meters.  This also means that I can't check my daily use on line the way I could with a smart meter, so I need to check the meter to see how much we are using.  I will do so and report back, so stay tuned.

By the way, this makes it occur to me that anyone who doesn't like their smart meter could switch to a time of use meter.  That's assuming that the TOU meter doesn't put out the electromagnetic radiation that some people are sensitive to.

oops, a lesson learned

I had some fun parking in San Francisco at the Sutter Stockton garage yesterday. They have outlets around the garage available to plug in, so I did.  Unfortunately, the outlets are too high for the battery charger to rest on a support.  So the weight of the charger pulled the cord and caused it to malfunction the next time I tried to charge the car--i.e. I got up this morning and the car wasn't recharged.  That was an unpleasant surprise.  So I took the car to the dealer and they replaced the unit for no charge (no pun intended)--I was lucky.  I won't do that again.

Who Killed the Electric Car?

We just watched this film for the second time, and I highly recommend it.  The film was made in 2006, and it still is very relevant.  Plus, a follow up film, Revenge of the Electric Car is coming soon--you can follow their blog at http://www.revengeoftheelectriccar.com/_blog/the_Blog

Who Killed the Electric Car finds the oil companies, car companies, government, and gullible consumers all guilty for the destruction of about 5000 electric cars such as GM's EV1 and Ford's Impact around 2003.  At that time the oil industry successfully lobbied California to drop its zero emission vehicle requirement and the U.S. car companies went happily along selling SUVs and Hummers.  Now that prices have skyrocketed for oil, and there is no sign of a let-up, we hope that the car companies have learned that their future is not tied to the fortunes of the oil industry.

As the web site for Revenge of the Electric Car states,

 "With almost every major car maker now jumping to produce new electric models, Revenge follows the race to be the first, the best, and to win the hearts and minds of the public around the world.  It’s not just the next generation of green cars that’s on the line.  It’s the future of the automobile itself."

One month mileage/solar report

It has been one month since we got back from San Diego.  Our total for the month since then is 901 miles and 5.9 gallons of gas for an average of 153 miles per gallon.  We drove about 220 miles on gas, mostly on a trip to Santa Rosa, so we went about 680 miles on electricity.

Since January 19, the solar panels have generated 239 kilowatt hours (kwh).  Remember that January/February are low sunlight months, so we weren't expecting too much solar.  Our meter shows that we have used 436 kwh, so the total used is 675 kwh (since the total is the meter reading plus the solar output).  Estimating that about 350 kwh were for our household use, that leaves 325 kwh for the car.  Since 680 miles were on electricity, that comes to 2.1 miles per kwh.  This is significantly less than the 3.3 miles per kwh that I had been expecting.  Stay tuned for more on this topic.

Driving Internal Combustion Engine cars

This week we worked on our 1991 Honda Civic to give it to my mother-in-law, so we were driving it around.  Now that electric cars are a real possibility, it felt anachronistic to be driving a car that still uses gas, pumping CO2 into the air, requiring drilling in the Gulf, pipelines in the Arctic, wars in the Middle East, and costing more than an electric car. 

I always used to feel bad about all the down sides of using gasoline, but it seemed that there was no alternative--did I want to go to chorus rehearsal?  did I want to go to a Democratic Club meeting?  did I want to go to the movies?  All of these things are possible on public transit or bicycle, but they are so much more difficult and time consuming that these environmentally sound travel options would really limit my activities. 

But now, with solar panels and the Volt, it feels really good to have the freedom that an automobile offers without the worst side effects (there are still the negative considerations of lack of exercise, urban sprawl, and resources used to build the car, but solving global warming, stopping pollution of air/sea/land from oil, and ending wars for oil are such great benefits, that I am an enthusiastic backer of electric cars.

super bowl ad for the Volt

In case you missed it, here is an ad for the Volt that aired during the Superbowl:  Volt Ad

So much global warming

OK--I know.  The byword this winter is "So much FOR global warming" what with all the cold weather and snowstorms in the U.S.  But check it out--the temperatures in northern Canada have been warmer than ever.  The picture shows temperatures from mid-December, 2010 to mid-January 2011.  The blue areas represent colder than usual, white is close to normal, and green, yellow, and red are warmer.  Plus the much reduced and record low ice cover and relatively warmer temperatures mean that the air contains about 4% more moisture than "normal" so it snows a lot more when it does snow. 

Meanwhile, here in California, it has been record warm.  Nice for swimmng, but nothing to gloat about however, since it has also been very dry--another prediction of global warming for the entire southwest.  In fact, a very scary picture is forecast for all the planet 50 years from now if we don't stop using fossil fuels:

In this image the purple colors indicate severe drought--much worse than the dust bowl of the 1930s.  The red colors indicate dust bowl conditions.  So the entire U.S.--along with the world--is headed for a food crisis in the fairly near future.
These images are from the blog Climate Progress

That's why we need electric cars and solar panels!

What did the electric car say when asked if it needed gas?

No tanks!

(sorry, I couldn't resist)

A Bump in the Road—Newfangled Gizmo Charges

Now I believe in giving credit to PG&E for their E9 Electric Car rates—they are a boon to both electric cars and solar power. However, I have learned that there are two catches: "meter charges" and "minimum charges". The meter charge is 22¢ per day and the minimum charge is 15¢ per day. With a few other nominal charges this comes to about $12 per month. This raises the cost per kwh for our system to 13.25¢ per kwh, which is higher than the regular Tier 1/Tier2 combined rate of 12.3¢.

On the one hand, the price is still pretty close, and the real reason for solar panels is to stop using fossil fuels, so it may not be a big deal. However, I do feel that we are very close to the point where solar panels will be cheaper than fossil fuels. At that point, even people who are not environmentalists will want to add solar panels. So this is an important issue.

So I asked PG&E what the justification is for these extra charges. The answer was something about it being "in the tariffs," i.e. because it was legal. Obviously this doesn't explain what the actual cost to PG&E is for using a Time of Use (TOU) meter. In fact, it reminded me of the early 1970s when we first got a telephone answering machine. The phone company tried to tack on a monthly charge because "we were attaching this [newfangled gizmo] to their phone lines." After some shouting at increasingly higher level supervisors, the telephone company backed off and dropped the charge.

At the very least I think PG&E should not call the 15¢ per day a "minimum charge". From that title, I assumed that it would only apply in the summer when we generate more solar electricity than we use. In the winter, we already pay for more than the minimum charge for our electricity. But PG&E says this 15¢ gets added on every month. So I think it should be called "additional charge" rather than "minimum charge". In fact, it could be called "solar penalty fee" since it makes solar less competitive.

These charges raise the whole question about why PG&E doesn't accept feed-in tariffs from people who produce more solar power than they use. We sized our system to zero out the PG&E bill since they won't pay for more. Now we learn that their monthly charges don't zero out, but come to around $144 per year. This definitely deserves more attention. Stay tuned.

 

 

For those who like numbers—doing the math

Here are my calculations for zeroing out our PG&E bill (Pacific Gas & Electric is our local utility) and figuring out how much the electricity actually costs. One feature that is really nice with the Volt is that you can program it with the daily and weekend rate schedule. We have it programmed so it only charges during off-peak hours—12 Midnight to 7 AM and most of the day on weekends.

If you want to skip the math, the bottom line is that the solar electricity is estimated to cost us about 11.4 cents per kilowatt hour--i.e. less than the lowest household rate PG&E now offers.

Assumptions:
The web site PVwatts ver 1, see: http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/calculators/PVWATTS/version1/ predicts that our 3.24 kilowatt system (18 panels rated at 180 watts each) with a 15 degree tilt, oriented in a southwest direction will generate 64% of its annual energy in the summer, and will generate 43% of that summer energy in the peak hours of 2 – 9 PM. PVWatts also estimates that the system will generate 4436 kilowatt hours (kwh). However, since there is some shading due to an apartment building behind our house,I am inclined to stick with the more conservative estimate of 4265 kwh given to us by Super Solar, our contractor. (By the way, they did a super job, and I am happy to recommend them: http://www.supersolar.us/ )
Combining those assumptions with the following PG&E - E9 rate schedule for the Pacific coastal region:

Summer rate schedule (Peak is 2-9PM M-F, off peak is 12 AM – 7 AM M-F and weekends except 5 – 9 PM): (sorry about the numbers not lining up---I'm still trying to get the hang of this)

Rate Structure	Baseline (KWH)	130%        Baseline	200%       Baseline	300%        Baseline
Territory T	249.0	323.7	498.0	747.0
Peak ($/kwh)	0.28741	0.30470	0.44575	0.55420
Partial Peak	0.09406	0.11135	0.25240	0.36207
Off Peak	0.03565	0.05294	0.13998	0.18172

Winter rate schedule: No Peak time, off peak is the same as summer—12AM – 7AM M-F and weekends except 5 – 9 PM

Rate Structure	Baseline	130% Baseline	200% Baseline	300% Baseline
Territory T	294.0	382.2	588.0	882.0
Partial Peak	0.09394	0.11123	0.25227	0.36194
Off-Peak	0.04457	0.06186	0.13998	0.18172

The car will use about 300 kwh/month if we drive about 1000 miles per month on the electricity.
The house uses about 300 kwh/month based on past electricity bills.
From reading our meter reports online we use about 35% of our electricity between 2 and 9 PM, and we use about 10% in the off-peak.
Calculations:
PG&E Payment for solar electricity in the summer:

• 43% is generated on 5 days at 28.7¢per kwh: .43 x .287 x 5/7 =      0.088
• 57% is generated in partial peak at 9.4¢ per kwh: .57 x .094 x 5/7 =      0.038
• The weekend uses 2/7 of the power at about 4.76¢ per kwh: .0476 x 2/7 = .013
  Total summer payment per KWH of solar produced:             0.136

Now there are two credits that accrue due to the solar panels:
1. We use less energy in the peak than we produce with the solar. So even if the solar produced the same total number of kwh that we use—300 kwh per month—the solar would produce more of these in the peak hour, and generate a credit. Our cost of electricity in the summer is projected to be:

• 35% peak hour x .287 x 5/7 =         $ 0.072
• 55% partial peak x .094 x 5/7 =          0.037
• 10% off peak x .05     =         .005 (note that I am assuming Tier 2 pricing for the off-peak)
  Summer charges for electricity:        $ 0.114 per kwh
  The monthly charge would be 300 kwh x .114 = $34.20
  The monthly credit in the summer would be: .136 payment x 300 kwh = $40.80 per month
  Net credit = $6.60 for the six summer months = $39.60 per year

2. There is also a credit because the solar system produces more than the house consumes. The solar system produces 4265 kwh, but the house only uses 3600. This excess is produced in the summer, when the payment is 13.6¢ per kwh. 4265 – 3600 = 665 kwh extra. Multiply that by 13.6¢ = $90.44.
Therefore the total credit for the solar is $39.60 plus 90.44 = $130.04.
From this we have to subtract the cost of charging the car. For a year this would be 300 kwh/month x 12 months x 4¢ per kwh (average winter and summer) = $144.00.

This leaves a total PG&E bill of $13.96, (say $14) about one dollar per month, although I understand that PG&E charges a minimum of $6 per month to tie to the grid.
Stay tuned to see if these calculations all turn out to be correct.

Also in the realm of numbers is the question as to the actual cost of electricity with the solar system. For us, the 3.24 kw cost $17,010 minus an instant rebate of $948 from PG&E for an upfront cost of $16,062. This is eligible for a 30% tax credit (I'll start on that in a few days) so that brings the cost down to $11,243. For our 1927 house, we had to do quite a bit of electrical work--$3,860 minus 30% tax credit = $2700. This brings the total cost to right around $14,000.

Fortunately, we were able to refinance our house at 4% for 30 years to pay for this. That comes to $809.62 per year (say 810). Dividing the $810 by 4265 kwh comes to 19 cents per kwh. However, because of the rates discussed above we are covering the electricity for the house (3600 kwh per year) plus the electricity for the car (3600 kwh per year) = 7200 kwh for the $810 plus $14 = $824. Dividing $824 by 7200 kwh = 11.4¢ per kwh. The lowest PG&E household rate is now 11.9¢ per kwh, and that goes up quickly after the first tier, so the solar cost is very competitive.

Now to be honest, you don't need solar panels to qualify for the electric car charging rate. If you pay to have a second meter installed (I'm not sure of the cost of that) you can pay the regular household rate for your home and the E9 rates for your car. If you can keep your home in the baseline 11.9¢ rate, and charge your car for 4¢, then your average rate comes out to about 8¢ per kwh—so you save even more money without solar panels. But why be greedy? The solar rate is cheaper than you are paying now, and it is inflation proof—unlike the regular PG&E rates. And it helps reduce CO2, air pollution, and all the downsides of fossil fuels and nuclear. So, to me, it's worth it.

One last point—you may have noticed that interest rates have gone up since last Fall when we financed this. They are now closer to 5% than 4%. But also note that I didn't count the mortgage interest tax deduction that homeowners get. So even the current 5% is more like 4% if you itemize deductions.
   

Chevy Volt web site

I just posted a thread on the Chevy Volt site about our solar panels and our Volt.  Welcome to anyone coming from that link.  The Volt site has a lot of good information and discussion--check it out at http://gm-volt.com/

Chinese Plug-ins are Here!

Ten Chinese made BYD plug-in hybrids are being tested in Los Angeles.  BYD plans to sell tens of thousands in the U.S. next year at a cost of about $28,000.  This is sure to bring the price of the Volt down!
See the article http://www.plugincars.com/la-housing-inspector-logs-first-300-miles-byd-plug-hybrid-106717.html to learn more about the BYD.  We had thought to wait for the BYD but wanted to support Chevy in its groundbreaking efforts, and besides, we couldn't wait!



Bloggers on the Volt

I’ve been reading some blogs by Chevy Volt owners and have found that everyone so far (including myself) seems to really like the car.  I hadn’t expected it to be so much fun to drive; we bought it primarily because it was a way to reduce CO2, which we have to do to stop the climate catastrophe that is already underway and is sure to get much worse.  And the car does what it promised in that regard, but it is also satisfying to drive because it is so quiet and peppy.  When I pull onto High Street every day, I have to accelerate fairly quickly to make the merge.  The Volt zooms up to 30 mph so effortlessly and quickly that I am always amazed.

One drawback is that with the heater turned on the electric range goes down quickly. I assume the same is true of the air conditioner. Of course in Oakland we rarely need the heater or the air conditioner, but it is a consideration.  From the blogs it appears that the mileage range is more like 20 miles on a cold day when the heater is running.  There is also some debate about whether very cold temperatures are bad for the batteries.  My sense is that it is best to pre-start the car and warm it up using the house current in order to maximize driving range.  There is also a feature to buy seat warmers, which are more efficient than the fan, but we didn’t opt for that.  Needing heat and air conditioning is pretty basic for most of the U.S. so I’ll be interested to see if that is a problem for the Volt and other electric vehicles.

On the very positive side I found the comments from Felix Kramer of calcars.org particularly poetic (see full comments at http://gm-volt.com/forum/showthread.php?6534-Lucky-Family-First-to-Get-a-Volt-amp-a-Leaf)

Since we got our Volt on Dec. 22 and our Leaf Jan. 24, I've felt like we've taken a time machine to the future. Since as the Founder of CalCars.org I've been doing little else but talk and evangelize about this for a decade, I thought I'd be ready for this moment. But now that it's really here, it's far better than I ever imagined! Each car is like a 21st century space capsule, gliding silently through streets clogged with last-century vehicles. I was never so aware of the unique and ugly sounds from each gas-guzzler.  At stop lights I even feel their low-frequency vibrations. As a driver of a Prius since 2004, which 60,000 miles ago in 2006 was converted to a plug-in hybrid, and as an occasional driver of a RAV4 EV or a Tesla Roadster, I've had glimpses of how this feels. But it's completely different to drive this way almost all the time!  Each car greets the driver with fun as its first feature. The instant torque of electric motors turns each of them into rocketships at low speeds, and easy lane-changers on the highway.

Mileage report and CO2 footprint

This week we added 196 miles to the Volt.  Unfortunately we used just over a gallon of gas.  This was because yesterday we went to San Francisco in the morning, and then out to Hercules in the afternoon.  Since the San Francisco trip used most of the electric miles, the Hercules trip used mostly gas (about 40 of the 50 miles).  So for the two weeks we've been home in Oakland we've gone 507 miles on 4.7 gallons of gas, just over 100 miles per gallon.

I'm thinking that by planning ahead, we can avoid other errands on Mondays when I go to Hercules, so that those trips to Hercules will be mostly electric.  The problem with using one gallon of gas in a week is that a gallon of gas produces about 20 pounds of carbon dioxide.  If we did that every week, we would produce about 1000 pounds of CO2 in a year from the gasoline.  A sustainable level of CO2 emissions is about one ton per person per year.*  Therefore, producing 1000 pounds on driving makes achieving that goal very difficult--we need heat, food, other basic products, all of which produce CO2.  What's more, we like to fly places, which produces a lot of carbon dioxide, so it would be desirable to avoid any CO2 from driving.  Hopefully we'll achieve that in the weeks to come.  Of course getting over 100 miles per gallon is a good thing, and is a lot better than any internal combustion engine, so I feel good about that.

*Joseph Romm in the book Hell and High Water argues that the earth can only absorb about 8 billion tons of CO2 in a year.  Since there are about 7 billion people on earth, that means that each of us should limit our CO2 production to about one ton.  Unfortunately the U.S. currently emits about 20 tons per person, so we have our work cut out for us!  Solar power and electric cars are an important step to the one ton goal.