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Largest EV Charging Station In World Powered By Diesel-Powered Generators
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The Harris Ranch Tesla Supercharger station is an impressive beast. With 98 charging bays, the facility in Coalinga, California, is the largest charging station in the world. But to provide that kind of power takes something solar can’t provide — diesel generators.
In 2017, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that all Superchargers in the automaker’s network were being converted to solar, but as of now it isn't attached to any solar array.
Investigative journalist Edward Niedermeyer discovered that the station was powered by diesel generators hidden behind a Shell station. Reporters at SF Gate tried to find out how much of the station's electricity was from the generators, but couldn’t get a response from Tesla.
Largest EV Charging Station In World Powered By Diesel-Powered Generators
In 2017, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that all Superchargers in the automaker’s network were being converted to solar, but as of now it isn't attached to any solar array.
Investigative journalist Edward Niedermeyer discovered that the station was powered by diesel generators hidden behind a Shell station. Reporters at SF Gate tried to find out how much of the station's electricity was from the generators, but couldn’t get a response from Tesla.
There's no diesel plant onsite--look at the google map.
The original article (in 2015) was talking about a diesel trailer towed in to provide power to the original six superchargers.
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All that said, I'm not convinced that green power is totally green. I pay an extra couple of cents per kWh for "100% green power", but my provider lists "Other sources" as providing some % of my power. (Without proof) I assume that's power bought from surrounding states, probably from fossil fuel plants, and then offset by "green credits" or whatever.
What I REALLY dislike, is that my provider puts nuclear and hydro under "non-green" power. So If I go "100%" green, I'm probably getting power that was generated with MORE emissions than not.
Well, I just checked and actually 100% green doesn't use any open market electricity. It's all solar and wind (somehow). Still, I would rather put my money towards Nuclear, biomass, geothermal, and large hydro, but I don't have that choice.
There's no diesel plant onsite--look at the google map.
The original article (in 2015) was talking about a diesel trailer towed in to provide power to the original six superchargers.
...
All that said, I'm not convinced that green power is totally green. I pay an extra couple of cents per kWh for "100% green power", but my provider lists "Other sources" as providing some % of my power. (Without proof) I assume that's power bought from surrounding states, probably from fossil fuel plants, and then offset by "green credits" or whatever.
What I REALLY dislike, is that my provider puts nuclear and hydro under "non-green" power. So If I go "100%" green, I'm probably getting power that was generated with MORE emissions than not.
Well, I just checked and actually 100% green doesn't use any open market electricity. It's all solar and wind (somehow). Still, I would rather put my money towards Nuclear, biomass, geothermal, and large hydro, but I don't have that choice.
Yes, every residential and business customer can't buy solar and wind powered electricity - you're right, there's not enough to go around. But it's available for those who want it, and it's normally not the cheapest option for power provider, so I think that helps hold down demand.
Yes, every residential and business customer can't buy solar and wind powered electricity - you're right, there's not enough to go around. But it's available for those who want it, and it's normally not the cheapest option for power provider, so I think that helps hold down demand.
Wind and solar farms requires lots of real state (land). Maybe in the rural areas outside the city limits land is cheaper? A solar-panel array on one's house or lot may be feasible, but even so it is quite expensive for a lot of people. Power providers would need quite a lot of acreage to build such farms. Some would think that building solar farms in the desert (AZ, CA, UT) would be easier, but such areas aren't public lands. Most fall under Federal jurisdiction (Native, Indian lands, and so on).
This article was published in 2022. There are some charts and tables that indicate the products being used to generate electricity in the US. Solar, wind, and hydro aren't being used very much. https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/29/why-...nergy-yet.html
There's no diesel plant onsite--look at the google map.
The original article (in 2015) was talking about a diesel trailer towed in to provide power to the original six superchargers.
...
All that said, I'm not convinced that green power is totally green. I pay an extra couple of cents per kWh for "100% green power", but my provider lists "Other sources" as providing some % of my power. (Without proof) I assume that's power bought from surrounding states, probably from fossil fuel plants, and then offset by "green credits" or whatever.
What I REALLY dislike, is that my provider puts nuclear and hydro under "non-green" power. So If I go "100%" green, I'm probably getting power that was generated with MORE emissions than not.
Well, I just checked and actually 100% green doesn't use any open market electricity. It's all solar and wind (somehow). Still, I would rather put my money towards Nuclear, biomass, geothermal, and large hydro, but I don't have that choice.
California imports up to 1/3rd of its power. It's domestic energy is 50% NG. The next largest is solar @ 17% and Nuclear @ 8%. Same for wind. Keeping in mind that only 30% of energy produced actually makes it to the power outlets which is ironically around the same ratio of energy loss vs energy used in an ICE engine, so no.. ..California's grid is not 'green' .. nor are the EV's that are powered from its grid .. although it is fair to say it is 'greener' than several states. The truth is, short of Nuclear Fusion becoming a reality, we will never be able to sustain a modern society while producing purely Co2-less energy.. ..unless we went all in on Nuke (fission) plants..
Also Nuclear Fission isn't clean, it just doesn't produce Co2 as a biproduct, instead it produces waste that is very difficult and expensive to store safely and lasts a long time.
California imports up to 1/3rd of its power. It's domestic energy is 50% NG. The next largest is solar @ 17% and Nuclear @ 8%. Same for wind. Keeping in mind that only 30% of energy produced actually makes it to the power outlets which is ironically around the same ratio of energy loss vs energy used in an ICE engine, so no.. ..California's grid is not 'green' .. nor are the EV's that are powered from its grid .. although it is fair to say it is 'greener' than several states. The truth is, short of Nuclear Fusion becoming a reality, we will never be able to sustain a modern society while producing purely Co2-less energy.. ..unless we went all in on Nuke (fission) plants..
Also Nuclear Fission isn't clean, it just doesn't produce Co2 as a biproduct, instead it produces waste that is very difficult and expensive to store safely and lasts a long time.
Where'd you get that 30% of energy produced makes it to power outlets stat from? That's a very interesting thing to say, that needs some backing up because it's a pretty wild one.
This is California's electricity generation by source for the month of June of this year (most recent update): https://www.eia.gov/state/?sid=CA#tabs-4 where about a quarter of it was via natural gas and the rest in a combination of solar, wind, hydro, and nuclear with tiny bits from other sources. Keep in mind, that was June and spring and summer are generally far more favorable towards renewables (solar specifically) for California. Also keep in mind that these stats include only utility-scale solar generation so for California and a select few other states, it's missing a sizable part of the picture.
California's energy mix fluctuates wildly over the course of the day with shifting of export, import, and generation source. The batteries part is what has changed things dramatically as it's made reasonable the deployment of a lot more solar, with peak generation over peak demand because several sources like natural gas and nuclear are not easily dispatchable sources (that is to say, they incur a lot of issues in either economics/cost or wear from too rapidly reducing or ramping up production), because that energy can be used for storage on top of what's able to be transmitted elsewhere. That transmission bit also needs to be improved, but one interesting thing with the current infrastructure is that while California is a net importer, it also exports a lot of power during its peak solar generation period eastwards when they're hitting the afternoon shoulder so it cleans their grid, too. As we head towards the winter equinox, natural gas will temporarily start playing a more outsized role again unlike the EIA reading from June 2023, but each year the entire thing at any point year over year usually shifts substantially away from fossil fuels and towards renewables. You can see that even with today 10/10 this year versus last year.
Also keep in mind that both EIS and CAISO generally are not counting small scale solar or home battery which has become an increasingly large part of California's electricity production and consumption.
Your points sound close to what departed poster PacoMartin used to say about California's grid except it was slightly more understandable back when he was saying it initially a few years ago, because there wasn't much in deployments of storage batteries at the time yet and he was (erroneously) incredulous about the idea that utility scale storage could be deployed in any significant quantity in just a few years. He was absolutely wrong, but at least he wasn't doing it after the fact of it already happening.
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As for this topic, yea, expect this idiocy to keep coming back over and over again. It doesn't matter that it's not true, it gets people to click, gets the ad revenue, gets the cookies into your browser, gets the data to sell. They know this kind of material gets traction and it doesn't need to be true, it just needs a pool of fools to keep cycling it up over and over again. There are a couple of other good ones out there as well like that one that is purportedly a study on how EV charging is more expensive than ICE vehicle refueling that has you put in a lot of money to install a level 2 charger in your home and yet do it such an idiotic way that it takes five minutes each time to just get the plug in and somehow your work docks pay from your high income salary for those five minutes every day and meanwhile you also idiotically drive well out of your way many times a month to go fast charge for an hour. That gets cited and posted over and over again as well.
Last edited by OyCrumbler; 10-10-2023 at 08:37 PM..
Where'd you get that 30% of energy produced makes it to power outlets stat from? That's a very interesting thing to say, that needs some backing up because it's a pretty wild one.
So I was off by loss in grid, but in either case most energy generated by fossil fuels is lost long before it reaches your home, so there is little benefit an EV has over an ICE vehicle in the charging of an EV from a fossil fuel power plant in the terms of Co2 reduction, as long as both sources are using fossil fuels, Co2 output will not be marginally different, especially as more EV's become dependent on the grid. We could offset that signficantly with Solar and Wind but we would need aproximately 3x the generation output that exists in Fossil Fuel plants to replace them with green sources because we would need additional generation equipment to charge batteries to make up for any loss in generation during times where the wind is not blowing or night, for the time being, it is cost prohibitive and unlikely to happen in the next few decades so EV's for the time being will mostly be powered by Fossil Fuels or Nuclear Energy.
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Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
This is California's electricity generation by source for the month of June of this year (most recent update): https://www.eia.gov/state/?sid=CA#tabs-4 where about a quarter of it was via natural gas and the rest in a combination of solar, wind, hydro, and nuclear with tiny bits from other sources. Keep in mind, that was June and spring and summer are generally far more favorable towards renewables (solar specifically) for California. Also keep in mind that these stats include only utility-scale solar generation so for California and a select few other states, it's missing a sizable part of the picture.
California is not powered mostly on renewables when they are not using NG, they are buying the bulk of their energy from other states and using their fossil fuels instead. California buys the most energy out of any state in the country from its neighbors... There is only one state in this country that has even 25% renewables associated with its grid, surprisingly, it is not California or even Washington, it is Texas.
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