USPS To More Than Double Order of Electric Trucks (thehill.com) 223
The U.S. Postal Service will order more than twice the number of electric vehicles initially projected for its new fleet, the agency announced Wednesday. From a report: The move follows months of controversy after the Postal Service initially sought to make about 10 percent of its fleet electric. Now it plans to make at least 40 percent of its fleet electric. The Postal Service said in a statement it adjusted the fleet's Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement to include more electric vehicles under the current contract. The Postal Service is targeting a purchase of at least 25,000 electric vehicles, it said. The Postal Service said in February that its initial order to have 10 percent of its new trucks be electric included an option to adjust the percentage later, but the announcement sparked pushback from members of Congress and the Environmental Protection Agency. The Postal Service maintains the largest vehicle fleet in the federal government, and critics argued that not including more electric vehicles in the fleet would fly in the face of President Biden's push for the federal government to pursue carbon neutrality.
Electric grid possible problems? (Score:2)
I am all for the move to electric vehicles. I am just concerned that we don't have an electrical grid robust enough to support the speed at which the change could happen. Could off-peak become a secondary peak usage time if everyone is charging their vehicles at the same time?
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One day I’d imagine we could have long distance superconducting transmissi
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Interesting)
Outside of Texas, utility companies are pretty good at keeping their grids serviceable. By and large utility companies see the adoption of electric vehicles and are planning accordingly; rolling upgrades into their planned maintenance and implementing incentive programs to incentivize EV charging during off-peak.
Generally in the US, generating capacity is owned and operated by private companies who sell their electricity to the utility, who in turn sells it to the consumers. As demand increases the wholesale price of electricity goes up as well, and private companies will (and have been) investing in more capacity.
This isn't a hypothetical, this is what's actually been happening. I can pull up trade articles from nearly a decade ago explaining how utility companies have been planning ahead. Market share of EVs in the US is about 5%, and they accounted to about 5% of all sales in Q4 of 2021. This isn't a transition that will happen overnight.
=Smidge=
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If we had that technology is always daytime somewhere
Even if it were practical to rely on Europe or Asia for "daytime" when the entire continent is dark, you would have to be incredibly stupid to do so. Friendly neighbors are not guaranteed to be friendly always, witness the obvious situation with Putin and gas in Europe, but even close to home we have examples like Line 5 between Canada and the US;
https://www.theobserver.ca/new... [theobserver.ca]
As soon as any interests start to diverge, previous agreements mean nothing.
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It's already really bad, talk about heat waves and rolling black outs across the US. The infrastructure is old and having private companies running all of it means they've invested absolutely as little as possible to maintain their monopoly profits - because, what's oversight?
Postal vehicles are ideal (Score:5, Insightful)
Postal vehicles are nearly ideal for electric drive: lots of start and stop, returning to a central spot overnight, and they don't ever get far from the charging station; not even a need for long-range between charge.
They'd be charging overnight. At the current number of electric vehicles, this is the time when electric grid usage is very low, and electrical power is cheap. Postal vehicles won't cause electric grid problems, in fact, the opposite: they will be a useful load when few other loads are using power.
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The necessary upgrades will never occur if the can keeps getting kicked down the road.
Having large customers like this switch now is probably a good thing. They'll create some increased demand that will require increased capacity to the grid while individual users will likely take much longer to switch (even aside from resistance to switching, a lot of people buy and drive used cars and there just isn't the availability of discounted used EV's right now).
Even if the electricity being used is generated via
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:5, Informative)
I had more of an impact to my electrical bill with getting ductless ac for my home, then with my electric car.
Being that the most postal workers will drive 20 miles for a days worth of work, at slow speeds. EV energy usage is probably going to be much better than most people fear. We don't need 70kwh battery packs to charge, but smaller batteries that need less energy. As well most of the areas the Grid is actually more robust then you would think, especially as they would plug in during non-peek hour. However Post offices could also put in Solar panels for additional savings and support to the grid.
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ductless ac for my home, then with my electric car.
This is a very good point, and especially in places in the US where you have homes that are easily decades, many times even a century old of how much energy leakage happens. The way new model homes are built and insulated and with modern AC and heating systems are worlds apart in terms of energy needed to maintain livable temperatures in any season.
Also while we are in the summer air conditioners get all our scorn but it gets glazed over how much energy is expended during winter where individual homes are
Re: Electric grid possible problems? (Score:2)
Is a heatpump really that much more efficient?
I thought they barely edged out burning gas directly on site.
Re: Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Informative)
Heatpumps are way, way more efficent in providing heat than burning gas. They have a heatin coeffcent of 2.0 - 4.0 depending on type and conditions. Burning gas while above 90% efficent are by nature performing at less than a 1.0 coefficent in terms of performance because heat pumps are moving energy as opposed to using it to directly create heat.
Heat pumps are also getting a lot better at maintaining that efficency at colder temperatures which has generally been the downside, they lose efficency as outdoor temperatures drop but a lot units today would be far more efficent for 80% of days during winter seasons.
There are a lot of sources out there to back this up but the always good Technology Connections on youtube has a great little series on on it that is worth cehcking out: Heat Pumps: the Future of Home Heating [youtube.com]
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I asked our mail person, and for this small town post office the shortest route is 20 miles, the longest 75. Even if the longest has to stay gas, the other 4 could be electric.
The catch is how do the electric trucks do with chains on in the winter? But in general mail delivery is nearly ideal for an electric vehicle.
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Everybody won't be charging their vehicles at the same time. My car knows about the beginning and end times of the lowest rate, and the start time varies depending on how much energy will be needed. Some cars will charge at the beginning of the period. Is it a problem in Norway yet?
Utilities will gain a large amount of extra revenue, a fraction of the immense torrents of money currently going to gasoline and diesel, to upgrade the grid. Nearly all studies show extra revenue exceeds extra costs up to a
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Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Informative)
If all light vehicles in the US converted to electric, it would increase total annual kWh about 20%. If the conversion takes 20 years, then grid capacity needs to increase 1% a year. In the last 12 reporting months (to April 2022), utility capacity grew 2.9%. So we have it covered.
The reason capacity has grown more than 1% is solar and wind have generally lower "capacity factors" (their actual average output divided by rated capacity). Grid-wide demand is 41.6% of installed capacity. This allows for peak daily and seasonal demand, plus a reserve for plants that are not producing for whatever reason. If most vehicles are charged at night, that just means the plants that can run at night will be used more. Demand at night is typically half of daytime, so there is plenty of extra plant and grid capacity at those times.
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Very encouraging statistics. On the other hand...
"The governor [Newsom of California], a Democrat, ordered an analysis of the events that resulted in blackouts during a pandemic. He also moved to reduce demand and increase power supplies by asking consumers and businesses to use less electricity and ordered the California State Water Resources Control Board to produce more electricity from dams under its control." And "As triple-digit temperatures blanketed the West on Aug. 14 and 15 [2020], the California
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:5, Informative)
It's a multi-part issue.Is there enough generating capacity to support the extra demand?
Not needed. There is huge overcapacity in the generating capacity at night.
Moreover, is there enough transmission capacity
Not needed. There is huge overcapacity in the transmission capacity at night.
right down to the "last mile"?
OK, might need to upgrade the final connection from grid to post office.
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Not needed. There is huge overcapacity in the generating capacity at night.
There is now. Much of it is still non-renewable though. Solar produces nothing at night, so wind is the only viable alternative. I expect more demand at night will just further entrench the non-renewables that will be need to be there in the future for both daytime and nighttime peaks.
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Informative)
There is huge overcapacity in the generating capacity at night.
There is now. Much of it is still non-renewable though.
That adds nothing; much of all generating capacity is non-renewable now, day or night. However, in places where there is a significant renewable contribution to the grid due to wind, there is even more oversupply of generation at night. In Texas, there was even a time when the spot price of electricity went negative [slate.com] at night due to oversupply of power nobody was using. (Of course, Texas is a dysfunctional market in other ways as well).
Yes, you can speculate will happen when the electric car charging fraction of the electrical power market gets so enormous that it's larger than the daytime peaks, and simultaneously solar power is a large fraction of the generating capacity, but this is not going to be a real-world case until a long time in the future.
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However, in places where there is a significant renewable contribution to the grid due to wind, there is even more oversupply of generation at night.
No doubt, and that is great for now. Just pointing out it will only become a problem when you go to remove that non-renewable supply, which I presume for some is still an urgent goal.
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It's a multi-part issue.Is there enough generating capacity to support the extra demand?
Not needed. There is huge overcapacity in the generating capacity at night.
Moreover, is there enough transmission capacity
Not needed. There is huge overcapacity in the transmission capacity at night.
right down to the "last mile"?
OK, might need to upgrade the final connection from grid to post office.
It's not the generating capacity or transmission capacity that's the problem, it's that the huge percentage of people living in apartments have nowhere to charge overnight. Even the brand new fancy apartments they're building so many of around here only have 2-4 chargers for a 400+ unit complex, and they're *always* occupied. You'd probably need over 100 fast chargers per complex if everyone had an EV, and even then, everyone would be up all night playing musical parking spaces. Not to mention the 10MW+ ele
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Not needed. There is huge overcapacity in the generating capacity at night.
Is there, though?
Yes.
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Wonderfully cherry-picked.
Would you care to address the remaining points?
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:5, Funny)
Yep, next Thursday when everyone turns in their ICE vehicle and gets their new BEV we're all going to be shit out of luck. The grid will crash and we will revert to the stone age with no ability to go anywhere or ship goods.
If only this was going to be a slow, multi-decadal change where even the stupidest internet poster could identify possible issues years before they were a problem, giving us time to design around them.
Oh well, we had a good run.
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...giving us time to design around them.
Except that's not happening. The lead times on the infrastructure changes needed to achieve the long-term electrification goals are such that these things should already be under way, and they're not.
Take housing for example - the additional capacity for car charging on new-builds is still barely an afterthought, and typically a single point run from the domestic circuit when it's there, when proper provision for it should have been part of the design process years ago. (See also FTTH/FTTP)
I am reminded of
Re: Electric grid possible problems? (Score:3)
Yes it is. Did you miss this?
President Biden, USDOT and USDOE Announce $5 Billion over Five Years for National EV Charging Network, Made Possible by Bipartisan Infrastructure Law
Thursday, February 10, 2022
https://highways.dot.gov/newsroom/president-biden-usdot-and-usdoe-announce-5-billion-over-five-years-national-ev-charging [dot.gov]
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Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:5, Insightful)
Please don't pull assertions like "you will end up paying twice as much for electricity as you are paying for gas right now" out of your ass. That statement is completely false.
There is no real limit to the amount of electricity generation that we're capable of. Just solar rooftop already pencils out with a couple of year ROI, and we have absolutely no end of rooves we can apply it to. Local power generation does not require high energy power lines. There are also all sorts of solar panel improvements that are being researched right now that either increase the power they deliver, or drastically reduce the cost.
EVs get an equivalent of anywhere from 130 to 200 "MPG". It's literally more efficient to generate electricity using fossil fuels to then power vehicles, than put gas into an Internal Combustion Engine.
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There is no real limit to the amount of electricity generation that we're capable of.
But there are very definite limits to our ability to store, and/or provide it at high current on demand anytime of day.
EVs get an equivalent of anywhere from 130 to 200 "MPG". It's literally more efficient to generate electricity using fossil fuels to then power vehicles, than put gas into an Internal Combustion Engine.
Citation please. The only numbers that good for EVs that I see are the manufactures numbers, and the EPA's funny business bullshit calculations that exactly nobody has seen real world since they started putting those window stickers on cars. But even if we did accept that any EVs really deliver better than 100MPG driving around real town someplace with a passenger and some school books in
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:5, Insightful)
> But even if we did accept that any EVs really deliver better than 100MPG driving around real town someplace with a passenger and some school books in the trunk; its still damn unlikely you come out ahead after the distribution losses are factored.
It's very much true that they can deliver better than 100 MPG driving around town with a passenger and more than school books. I have direct experience. You come out very very much ahead after the small distribution losses are factored.
Distribution losses are under 10%. Efficient transmission and distribution of electrical power has been an engineering subject of interest since 1880 or so. Inefficiency directly loses utilities money and they have an incentive to lower this as much as is economically efficient.
On this subject (like some others) people often take a factually unjustified contrarian or curmudgeon attitude, as if any action which also has side environmental benefits must automatically be undesirable or the scientists so advocating are all incorrect or corrupt. I wonder if 120 years ago there were people who thought only soot shooting external combustion engines with shoveled coal were valid?
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Ok, some numbers for your citation.
Using JD Power's article here [jdpower.com];
1 US gallon of gasoline has the energy of approximately 33.7 kWh of electricity.
Per Ford [ford.com], the Lightning has a range of about 230 miles on the 98 kWh battery.
98kWh / 33.7 = 2.9 effective gallons.
230 / 2.9 = 79 "MPG"
Similarly, the Tesla Model 3 per EV Database [ev-database.org] has 75 kWh of usable battery, and a "real life" range of about 285 miles (I used the "middle" range, "mild" weather rating) - which then works out to 75/33.7=2.23 gallons, or about 127 "MP
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Informative)
> Citation please. The only numbers that good for EVs that I see are the manufactures numbers, and the EPA's funny business bullshit calculations that exactly nobody has seen real world since they started putting those window stickers on cars.
First, The EPA doesn't do any calculations. Fuel economy tests are performed by the manufacturers according to EPA prescribed procedures, and the results are filed with the EPA.
Second, the EPA provided economy estimates are pretty pessimistic. Again they are provided by the manufacturer, so the manufacturers tend to underpromise and overperform: Nobody is going to complain that their car is getting better economy than was advertised. It should be pretty easy to beat the EPA's published numbers in any vehicle if you drive like a reasonable person.
Third, and I can only spec with personal experience with this, I drove about 90 miles in my EV today - highway mostly 55-60MPH (up to 70 in spots) with the AC blasting, and the dashboard says I averaged 4.8 mi/kwh. 1 gallon of gasoline is 33.7 kwh, so 4.8 mi/kwh is equivalent to ~161 MPG. My personal best is 6.2 mi/kwh which is ~209 MPG (I can probably do better than that but it would require some legit hypermiling strategies.)
Basically any EV that gets 3.0 mi/kwh (or 33.7 kwh/100 miles if you're one of those assholes...) you're doing 100 MPG equivalent... which isn't hard to achieve.
If you want more data there's no shortage of range tests and reviews online...
=Smidge=
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree with the intent, however some of you facts need to be adjusted. EPA Peak MPGe is 141MPGe for a production car most EVs range from 60MPGe to 143 where the average is around 100MPGe
Also I would also add, with Fuel based cars, you have only one way to get energy, that is by drilling for oil and refining it to gasoline. For Electricity we have a large numbers of ways to produce Electricity, Wind, Solar, Hydroelectric, Nuclear, Chemical, Fossil Fuels (more than just gasoline) When one source of electricity becomes too expensive, we are able to switch and focus on a cheaper type. For example despite the Cable News channels, the reason why Coal power isn't as popular as it was before, isn't because of environmental reasons, or because politics is making it unpopular. But because Natural Gas Power became a cheaper source. Now that Solar is getting cheaper as well, it is taking an increased portion of the grid.
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Electricity is San Antonio went up this year and is projected to go up another 11% by 2027.
https://www.ksat.com/news/loca... [ksat.com]
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, the US would find it easier to switch if people didn't live miles and miles away from their jobs and if there was adequate public transportation and zoning so people didn't make long journies. So it's not just one thing that needs to change but a concerted effort across a lot of things - how & where people live, how they travel, how they work etc.
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Well, for the US, you need to take this as a given with any talk about energy and transportation.
It isn't going to change anytime soon, doubtful if it will change at all in several lifetimes.
It's a big country and for a large number of us, we like to live with a bit of elbow room, not stacked on top of ea
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The entire problem of climate change would be a lot simpler to solve if people in developed countries were willing to significantly reduce their standard of living and people in undeveloped countries were willing to continue living at subsistence levels.
Asking people to do that is completely reasonable, but forcing it is a pitchforks and torches non-starter.
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:5, Interesting)
To be fair though this is a pretty specific use case that is pretty well known not to be in favor of BEV's at this time.
Now I am not sure if Ford is marketing F150 Lightnings as great towing vehicles for trailers and RV's because it's pretty well know they are not at the moment. As the video states even empty this is a 6000lb trailer (and you can get a pretty large RV trailer in a 6000lb package) which is a pretty good weight for a trailer and something that for long highway trips is usually more the realm of the next class up of trucks like F250, F350, Silverado 2500 and diesel class although you certainly can use a standard F150 with reduced mileage but these are vehicles with no reasonable BEV competition at the moment for that very reason.
I think it's pretty fair to say that if you are doing lot's of highway towing a BEV is not right for you yet. Situations like that are pretty tough to beat gas and especially diesel with current battery tech, to me that's a pretty clear reason we haven't seen any Tesla Semi's being delivered to customers yet and probably won't for some years yet.
I think it's pretty fair to say though that probably less than 50% of pickups sold in the USA will ever tow anything in their lifetimes and most are really just a different style of SUV in terms of use case and that's a more fair comparison of a current BEV truck.
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Yeah, exactly there are lots of trials happening right now, how many are on the road doing the actual work right now? Not many and most of the first applications will be short local routes with known distances. There have been trials for long haul over-the-road style trucking for sure but no viable commercial behichles in fleets today even taking out the autonomous pieces (which is a whole seperate problem)
The battery weight is a problem, the range at full load is a problem and the fact that there is limite
Re: Electric grid possible problems? (Score:2)
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Yeah for sure, i think all the grid concerns are way overblown. Theres always money to be made in selling energy so there will always be supply to meet increased demand. I think a lot of environmentalists may have to eat some crow since wind and solar has been something that has caught on with just market forces (its got good ROI)
I think even with all the battery capacity being built passenger vehichles and other applications will be priority use cases. Electric vehichles are just too good for most peopl
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That's because the Ford Lightning's target demographic is your typical suburban dweller who only has a truck because they think it looks cool. The bed is for hauling materials for their weekend warrior projects that they might start someday, and bringing home their next Black Friday big screen TV and/or a made-in-China barbecue grill that will last two seasons and then vanish in a *POOF* of rust.
Re:Electric grid possible problems? (Score:4, Funny)
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It's not even a huge savings to switch to EVs right now. I was watching a test of the F-150 Lightning and they were recharging on a road trip...
Yeah, the Lightning sucks for anyone who plans to use it as a truck.
This doesn't mean EVs aren't a good idea, or even that electric trucks aren't a good idea. It just means that the Lightning sucks. Specifically, it has insufficient range. There's a reason that pickups typically come with very large gas tanks, usually big enough for 600 miles of range, and it's not because pickups need to drive 600 miles between gas stations. For those same reasons, electric trucks need to have 500-600 miles of range to b
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the Lightning sucks for anyone who plans to use it as a truck.
No question it's not a good way to pull a TT. I had hoped the range would be more like half than a third. I didn't actually watch the video so I didn't pay attention to how fast they went — I don't drive anything too big and goofy over 65 tops, except occasionally downhill. I literally drive our RV at 60 because even at that speed I can tell the drag is mounting up. I might consider cutting it down to 55 while cruising, I need to do some longer trips and play with the cruise and the scangauge a bit mo
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I am all for the move to electric vehicles. I am just concerned that we don't have an electrical grid robust enough to support the speed at which the change could happen.
This is a very real problem that NOBODY wants to talk about.
No, not really. Most EV charging happens overnight, when the grid is least loaded. As a result, the general consensus is that *if* people schedule their charging appropriately (ie, after 10 P.M., not at 6 P.M.) electrification won't require much (if any) additional generator capacity or grid capacity, with the possible exception of localized high-voltage buildouts for DCFC to accommodate long-distance driving.
All across the country the electrical grid is already struggling from a combination of increased demand and decades of under-investment by the power companies.
During the day. Electric vehicles don't typically get charged during the day unless you're traveling a long distance or are leeching off of your employer's free charging. :-)
It is now summer and Texas is telling people to turn off their air conditioners to reduce strain on their electrical grid. What happens when Texas has a few million electric vehicles that need to be charged every day? What happens when there are 150-200 million vehicles nationwide that need to be charged every day?
The businesses that close down and stop running their air conditioning at night (which is nearly all businesses) will release all the grid capacity that they were using during the day, and that will be available for EVs to charge.
Also, the Texas grid won't have to charge all of the EVs in the U.S., only the EVs in Texas. If you replaced every vehicle in Texas (just shy of 8.1 million) with EVs, assuming that their average mileage remains 16,172 miles per year [thehartford.com] (44.3 miles per day), assuming a third of a kWh per mile, or 5391 kWh per year per car, that's 43.7 billion kWh per year for the whole state, or 119.6 million kWh per day. Assuming 30A charging, they'll spend an average of about two hours per night charging.
If nobody spreads the load at all, i.e. if they all charge in the same two-hour block, that's two hours of 7.2 kW per car times 8.1 million, or 58.32 gigawatts. This is still 20 gigawatt shy of record usage for Texas. Yes, that's a lot, but probably within the realm of possibility.
Assuming the load actually gets spread out roughly evenly (and automakers can easily achieve this through software), that's only 14.6 gigawatts, which should be *well* within the range of what can be easily handled.
These are very real problems that cannot just be hand-waved away.
These are very theoretical problems that all the experts say are unlikely to result in actual problems. Mind you, ERCOT's grid has major problems, and if anywhere in the U.S. is going to have problems, it is Texas. But that's what happens when you isolate yourself from the rest of the country's power grid to avoid being burdened by federal power regulations. You get a bunch of power companies that play fast and loose with safety and reliability.
Texas's energy problems are entirely Texas's fault, and it is Texas's responsibility to fix them. And those problems are going to cause major problems for Texas regardless of whether or not people drive more EVs. And EVs are unlikely to make those problems significantly worse than they already are, because as previously noted, people mostly don't charge their cars during times of day when energy use is highest.
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This is a very real problem that NOBODY wants to talk about.
It's discussed repeatedly.
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Re: Electric grid possible problems? (Score:2)
Maybe that's why it's only 40%?
Target the shortest by distance routes that's also likely have the most start and stop.
Now the USPS needs an intelligent charging station (Score:2)
Since most USPS truck do about 20-30 miles in a day, recharging won't take much time, but what they really need is chargers that will stagger the overnight charging, to minimize the peak load.
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Since most USPS truck do about 20-30 miles in a day
A couple people have made this statement in this thread - do you have documentation? I went looking but was unable to locate that information.
However I did find that the longest postal route in the US is 181.4 miles [usps.com].
(No agenda is intended behind the question... I'm just curious)
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"Just asking questions", eh?
The average postal route requires 24 miles of driving and nearly all of them are less than 70 miles. Current technology can therefore easily satisfy USPS requirements for EV deployment, as evidenced by foreign posts and private companies already making that transition.
https://postaltimes.com/postal... [postaltimes.com]
I think this was also addressed in the enormous document the post office made for the vehicle selection process but I can't find it now.
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Thanks! Given that I found that "longest route" on USPS' website, I figured the average route length should also be there; but it appears I was wrong.
Just based on my gut feeling, I would think the amount of time postal vehicles spend idling every day is also a good argument for moving to EVs.
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Oh definitely. It's like the dream scenario for EVs. All routes are known, lots of idling, stop and go, short trips, small overall route distance.
It's absolutely idiotic that they didn't go with a 90% EV fleet. Even a stock Transit EV could could just almost cover that longest route, let alone a custom EV.
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Simply limit the total draw on the charging circuit so they take however many hours the vehicles will sit idle.
Re:From who I wonder... (Score:5, Insightful)
As opposed to the previous company who was awarded the ICE fleet? What’s your point?
Yea, because Oil/Gas are #1 for campaign (Score:2)
contributions. [opensecrets.org] Why else do you think Joe Manchin keeps acting like a Republican wearing a D and sabotaging the fuck out the party he claims membership of? Look who got the most money.
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You know his point
Trolling. His point is always trolling.
Re:From who I wonder... (Score:5, Informative)
It's the same company (Oshkosh Defense) this just changes the amount of which variant they are purchasing.
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Rascal Scooters
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Jesus Chrap the junk mail.
I realize there are entire industries dependent on that garbage right now, but how much good does it do anybody that six to seven days a week we get a huge packet of shit that just goes straight into the recycle bin or the trash? Maybe once a week, though likely only twice total a month, we have something we want arrive via the post office. The rest of the time it's just trash and bills that we've already paid online but they haven't offered us an opt-out for the paper delivery.
The
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I realize there are entire industries dependent on that garbage right now, ...
First and foremost of those "industries" is the Postal Service itself. Without junk mail, it probably couldn't continue [newsweek.com].
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I've heard that said for decades. If that's the case, then maybe the current version of the postal service needs to go away.
I do think we need a government funded delivery service. I'm not sure six days per week of complete bullshit is the correct way to do it. UPS doesn't deliver junk mail six days a week and they still manage. Yes, it's a different scale, but perhaps in the modern era the old scale just doesn't . . . scale.
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Still easier to browse thru a few piece of paper, than navigating the store website or PDF file.
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Where I live USPS is by far the best. (Score:2, Troll)
Even after being deliberately sabotaged by Mango Mussolini [justsecurity.org] ahead of the last election. FedEx is by far the worst, though, agree there.
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Everywhere I've lived UPS has been the best. I saw no degradation in quality after President Trump appointed a committee to investigate the USPS, they've always been absolute shit for me. Just the other week they bent a gold foil Etsy print I had been waiting a month for because the asshole was too lazy to walk to my door (which UPS and FedEx always get out of their trucks to do), and when I made a claim they just said "lol not our problem." At past houses they've put up "sorry, you weren't home" stickers
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Ok?
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What a waste of taxpayer money. Use the existing trucks but only deliver once or twice a week, and you'd save way more money, energy, and CO2 emissions.
You made the claim. Now show your math. I'll check back.
Oh and bulk mail is what keeps the post office from going under.
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>You made the claim. Now show your math. I'll check back.
You want me to show the math that reducing their activity an order of magnitude will reduce their CO2 by an order of magnitude?
Here's a question for you: the USPS spends 6 days a week sorting and delivering a bunch of bullshit fucking mail that no one wants and which is harming the environment; if you remove that bullshit mail and make them deliver only important mail once a week, will their CO2 usage go up, stay the same, or decrease? Please expla
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Also make it possible to opt out of all junkmail, and it becomes a felony if you send that trash to someone who doesn't want it.
Okay, but then how are you going to fund USPS? Better be prepared for a massive increase in regular postal costs, without the junk mail subsidy.
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how are you going to fund USPS? Better be prepared for a massive increase in regular postal costs, without the junk mail subsidy.
The only time I even stamp and send anything any more is when I'm sending paperwork to the government, and even that has been reduced substantially over time. Processes which used to take multiple paper forms now take just one, or even none. Sometimes they send you something on paper, but then you can respond via the internet. The costs for first class mail could increase literally tenfold and they would not substantially impact my life. And if the postal costs did increase, then more businesses would be m
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The USPS already charges me as much as UPS or more to send a package, and there's a non-negligible chance they'll misdeliver the package, damage it, or otherwise fuck up. Plus their tracking is 100% useless and might as well be a Ouija board.
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Also make it possible to opt out of all junkmail, and it becomes a felony if you send that trash to someone who doesn't want it. Imagine how many millions of trees and billions of tons of CO2 can be saved.
As long as we're talking about banning advertising over physical mail, can we also ban it on TV, radio, and the internet?
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The government pays drivers to drive millions of times around the country to deliver advertisements that you see on the TV, radio, and Internet, and which consume significant physical resources and emits CO2 both when it's produced and discarded?
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I think this thread has some great ideas, but I wonder about the human factor. For postal workers delivering mail, efficiencies (and low error rates) come with routines. If you went to a different route/neighborhood for each day of the week, things would get fucked up. Maybe eliminating junk mail from the system would lower the error rates as well.
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Goddamn those evil CoNsErVaTiVeS for bending my Etsy prints and delivering to my neighbors and closing claims with essentially "lol not our problem" when I show them the damage they caused! It's them ebil hick republicans that are responsible for my carrier lying about coming to my door when I have footage of it! God I hate them so much!
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Maybe if postal employees were better paid they would take better care of your mail? You pay someone low wages and seem shocked they could give a fuck about things.
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Maybe they should get jobs at UPS then, since they must be paid like kings to somehow always be able to do the functions of their job.
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Conservatives have no intention of allowing private companies to do as they please unless it is polluting the environment where the po' folk live and not near the Conservatives' golf courses.
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With what we've seen with the insane costs electric vehicle manufactures charge (like they're change $20k to replace an entire battery when you can replace just the bad cells for ~$5k .. normal people wouldn't pay that and junk the car, but government would),.
The latest cars have batteries that will outlive the mechanical bits, so the battery issue is close to a non-issue now. Battery removal will be more for secondary usage. For example, it used to be that Renault charged you a per-mile fee so that when your battery needed renewal you'd already paid for it. Now Renault doesn't bother as the wheels will fall off the car before the battery needs to be replaced so there's no point. By the time it is worn out, assuming the car has managed to keep its wheels on, tec
Re:want to seriously pursue carbon neutral? (Score:5, Informative)
I agree with junk Mail, should just be charged more.
However the post office, is often the nearest and most convent federal government building, that we also use for more than just postage, but to fill out government forms like for Selective Service when males turn 18, or getting a passport. Rural areas especially rely heavily on the post office for our daily lives. As the last mile delivery is far more reliable than the Commercial Deliveries who may decide to sit on your 2 day delivery for a week just so they don't have to drive out until they have more packages.
Re: want to seriously pursue carbon neutral? (Score:2)
Junk mail is how they make their money.
Big bundles (250+ pieces) that they don't need to sort, but instead just ship as a package to where they go.
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Close 3/4 of local post offices
More contract post offices. Stop by the general store. Drop off my mail. Pick up some stamps, liquor and ammunition.
Feinstein's husband has passed away. So they don't need to keep that lucrative real estate contract [21cpw.com] with CBRE anymore.
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Junk mail funds the post office. So you'll be wanting to raise your taxes to cover the shortfall.
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Sign me up.
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if they don't have the same workload, then costs can be reduced. It's a win-win.
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Re:I hate the USPS (Score:5, Informative)
Packages always late, and no accountability.
Yeah, wonder why. https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy on Tuesday unveiled the largest rollback of consumer mail services in a generation, part of a 10-year plan that includes longer first-class delivery windows, reduced post office hours and higher postage prices.
Re: Double standards (Score:2)
I don't remember anybody being called part of the resistance for supporting the final stimulus check that Trump wanted.
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Are you kidding me? Look up what the inside of a sorting station for the Post Office looks like, there is automation everywhere there can be. This very topc is about replacing aging hardware, it's not up the eomployees to decide when they can be allocated new trucks, hell the employees are the ones who have been keeping the existing LLV fleet working.
We are also talking about something that is pretty tricky to automate. Packages and letter than can be of wildly varying size, weight, contents. Some of th