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CODA to Provide Energy Storage for Solar Integrated Electric Vehicle Fast Charging Station in the San Francisco Bay Area

August 29, 2013 in Battery Energy Storage, Electric Vehicles, EV charging, EV News, Solar

Eco-Station will create additional revenue streams and advanced functionality for site operators

CODA Energy Logo.   Image courtesy of CODA

CODA Energy Logo.
Image courtesy of CODA

MONROVIA, Calif., Aug. 27, 2013 /PRNewswire/ — CODA Energy, with Energy Vault and Growing Energy Labs (GELI), will deploy the first Eco-Station, a solar integrated electric vehicle (EV) fast charging station optimized by energy storage, in the San Francisco Bay Area.  The charging station will incorporate a 175 kW solar array, DC fast charging, a 40kWh CODA Core™ UDP energy storage system, and GELI’s intelligent Energy Operating System (EOS) software.

DC charging, which refuels a typical EV battery in 30-60 minutes, improves the usability of EVs by extending their effective range and enabling road trips.  These stations require high quantities of power to operate, and as a result, incur costly utility peak demand charges that can add up to hundreds or thousands of dollars per month.  The Eco-Station contains a battery energy storage system (ESS) supplied by CODA Energy that mitigates this problem by serving as a buffer between the charger and the grid, lowering the charging station’s peak power demand.  The addition of GELI’s intelligent Energy Operating System (EOS) software will enable the Eco-Station to make operational decisions based on the price of power and energy, which in conjunction with demand response programs, could bring site operators new sources of revenue.

“As is the case in California, electric vehicle adoption tends to correlate with renewable energy deployment,” said Ed Solar, COO, CODA Energy. ”Energy storage complements these technologies by reducing operational costs, improving functionality, enabling new revenue streams and mitigating grid stress.”

  • Energy storage enables the Eco-Station to make smart choices with respect to electricity prices and the environment.  During peak consumption periods, costly utility demand charges are minimized.  At night, stored solar power can be used to charge vehicles and inexpensive, off-peak energy can be used to recharge the battery.  When the Eco-Station is unoccupied during the day, it can sell excess generated or stored power back to the grid and generate revenue.
  • Energy storage optimizes the delivery of zero emissions, solar electricity.  Fast charging stations with integrated solar panels typically rely on grid power – even when the sun is shining – as the power needs of the vehicles and chargers often exceed the output of the solar array.  A single CODA energy storage tower can discharge up to 100kW of power, far exceeding the capacity of common DC chargers.  This allows drivers to refuel with 100% zero emissions electricity generated on-site.  As charging systems are developed with even faster charging rates, energy storage will limit the need for expensive grid connection upgrades.
  • Energy storage enables the Eco-Station to provide valuable grid services.  The CODA ESS enables the Eco-Station to participate in utility demand response programs and provide valuable grid services, creating additional revenue streams for the station operator.  Multiple Eco-Stations connected by sophisticated network control software could become a valuable dispatchable load source during peak demand periods.

About CODA Energy

CODA Energy designs and builds scalable energy storage solutions that support a smarter, cleaner and more reliable grid.  The CODA Core UDP™ combines advanced batteries with proven battery and thermal management systems (BMS and TMS), all managed through a sophisticated power source controller.  CODA energy storage systems are optimized for generation, distribution and behind-the-meter applications for commercial and industrial end users.  CODA Energy professionals have deployed a combined 140 MW and 50 MWh of energy storage in stationary and mobile applications to date.

This article is a repost, credit: Coda Energy, http://www.codaenergy.com/.

Oil Price is Bullish for Electric Car Sales

July 7, 2013 in EIA, IEA, Oil, Politics

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The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that world oil demand will outstrip world oil supply over the next six months (June 12, 2013, Oil Market Report: http://omrpublic.iea.org/).  The United States is acutely vulnerable to an oil shock due to its heavy reliance on oil imports.  Progressive state and local governments need to be aggressive on electric vehicle adoption and set the trend.  It’s time to leave the internal combustion engine behind and move forward.

In the first half of 2013, US crude oil production increased 282,000 barrels a day, according to the US Energy Information Administration.  The latest production number was 7.267 million barrels a day for the week ending 6-28-13, which is down from the 5-3-13 number, 7.369 (almost two full months earlier).  The EIA had estimated earlier in the year that this production number would near 8 million barrels by 2014.

Source: US Energy Information Administration

Source: US Energy Information Administration

The IEA predicts that world oil demand will be about 91.2 and 92 million barrels a day in Q3 and Q4 respectfully.  The agency sees world oil supply falling short of these demand estimates.

The price of WTI oil is $103.22, and Brent is $107.72.  The oil market is telling us that the world has an oil addiction problem.  The closing of the WTI-Brent spread tells us that shale oil production is not expected to overwhelm oil infrastructure.  The US economy wants to power forward, but it needs affordable domestic energy to sustain growth.

Is this 2008 all over again?  Certainly, there are alternatives.

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Speeding Electric Vehicle Adoption Rates will Reduce Climate Change

June 24, 2013 in Climate Change, Electric Vehicles, EV News, Greentech, Politics

President Barack Obama and Chief of Staff Denis McDonough walk on the South Lawn of the White House, June 3, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza) Courtesy of The White House

President Barack Obama and Chief of Staff Denis McDonough walk on the South Lawn of the White House, June 3, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
Courtesy of The White House

The international mood on climate change was becoming a bit heated.  You could feel the wind blowing even before the NOAA.  President Obama probably felt some of the heat coming his way in Washington.

In a video release yesterday, President Obama stated: “I’ll lay out my vision for where I believe we need to go: a national plan to reduce carbon pollution, prepare our country for the impacts of climate change, and lead global efforts to fight it.”

Electric vehicles are the leaders in the vanguard to fight climate change.  EV adoption drives clean energy adoption.  Hence, a wider adoption scale of EVs, domestically and internationally, will greatly speed the change to renewable energies.  A prolonged national education campaign on the benefits of electric vehicles would be in the national interest.  Here are three basic themes:

  • Educate consumers on the long-term benefits of electric vehicles
  • Educate mayors on best practices to adopt electric vehicles
  • Educate large employers on the benefits of workplace charging and electric fleet vehicles

The President needs to tune out all the political noise and just move the country forward.  Clean energies are the best long-term direction for the country.  These technologies are a boom for the economy, and the United States should strive to lead in all categories: solar, wind, geothermal, water, as well as grid and battery technologies.  There are too many technologies and subsets of technologies within this clean energy category to list.

ARPA-E 2012 Keynote: President Bill Clinton

Courtesy of US Department of Energy

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Time to Join the Party: Early Data on Plug in Adoption and Industry Investment, By Barry Woods

February 28, 2013 in Economics, EV News, Politics

Barry Woods of DriveEVs and Plug In America Director

Barry Woods of DriveEVs and Plug In America Director

By choosing to employ regulatory streamlining and supportive policies and incentives on consumer deployment and in-state industry development, Oregon and California now have evidence that those dollars leverage high economic value.

In late 2009 in Oregon, a few EV oriented businesses, manufacturers and professionals created an industry cluster in a third floor conference room of the Portland Development Commission, and concocted a strategy to harness state funds to promote its development.   Now called Drive Oregon, the group convinced the Oregon Innovation Council of its value and successfully lobbied state legislators to invest $1.2m of state funding at a time when the state’s budget left many lawmakers on the retreat, cutting public safety measures and teacher salaries.  The pitch, that Oregon needed to have a means of fueling its EV industry cluster’s growth and have a conduit for federal and private grants funding alternative fuel technologies, was persuasive but not without great uncertainty.  Should Oregon gamble on using state funds to fuel development in a sector that many, even today, dismiss as doomed to fail?  Recently the Northwest Economic Research Center (“NERC”) released the results of its first study designed to define what companies constitute Oregon’s EV cluster and measure its strength and economic impacts.

Tom Potiowsky, director of NERC and former Oregon state economist, concluded that: “Our research indicates that the electric vehicle industry generates gross economic activity of $266.56 million, total value added of nearly $148 million and provides more than $89 million in total employee compensation.  The industry continued to grow during the Great Recession, while other transportation industries suffered enormous losses.”

NERC estimated that EV economic activity created a ripple effect, adding 1169 jobs to the economy in addition to the 411 full-time EV jobs.  Tax revenue to the state amounted to $11.9m and $20.8m to the federal authorities.   More importantly, in a little over a year DriveOregon has gotten over forty businesses to join the cluster and leveraged over $2.5 million dollars to date through its matching grants program.

Why has the EV industry taken root in Oregon?  Sophisticated local demand may explain some of this phenomena, a population given to a willingness to try new things for the benefit of themselves and the planet.    Oregon’s skilled workforce, supportive legislative and regulatory policy atmosphere, and a diffuse EV industry structure involved in manufacturing of different types of EVs, parts and components all contribute to its health. But it is more.  It took impassioned individuals and courageous political leadership.

What of the other side of the coin- deployment? What benefits might be achieved through a state’s aggressive measures to foster consumer purchasing of PEVs?

In the UCal-Berkeley study released in September 2012, titled, “Plug-In Electric Vehicle Deployment in California: An Economic Assessment”, focused on providing an economic assessment of the state’s accelerated deployment of PEVs.   Its author, David Roland-Holst, who employs a long-term economic forecasting model, concludes that:

-Light duty vehicle electrification can be a catalyst for economic growth, contributing up to 100,000 additional jobs [in California] by 2030.

-On average, a dollar saved at the gas pump and spent on other goods and services that households want creates 16 times more jobs. (Yes, read that again).

-The majority of the new demand financed by PEV fuel cost savings goes to in-state services.

Individual Californians gain from economic growth associated with fuel cost savings due to EVs, whether they buy a new car or not. Average real wages and employment increase across the economy and incomes grow faster for low-income groups than for higher-income groups.

(Emphasis added.)

In essence the type of savings achieved through PEV adoption are quite different than those expenditures on the fossil fuel supply chain, creating stronger multiplier effects on state product and job creation and providing a positive net value to those states that adopt them.  PEV-related transportation efficiency also stimulates job creation across all economic activities, not just in the  ”green collar” sector, through this expenditure shifting phenomenon.  Quite simply, “a dollar saved on traditional energy is a dollar earned by 10-100 times as many new workers.” (p.17)

The importance of these studies should not be underestimated.  They add yet another analytic block to the foundation supporting the business case for society’s investment in PEV technology and adoption and, perhaps most importantly, for the ongoing political support of policies designed to assist its rapid ascent.  When read in conjunction, these studies make clear that we have ever more to gain by the acceptance of EVs then “just” GHG reduction, balancing the grid, and a better driving experience.   We have local jobs to gain and, with them, hope for a sustainable energy future.  For California and Oregon, the gamble appears to be paying off.  Can other parts of the country afford to not to invest in a technology sector whose odds get more favorable all the time?

This article is a repost, credit: Barry Woods of DriveEVs http://www.driveevs.com/.