As a long-time Virginia booster, I just hate it when the Old Dominion so glaringly lags other states in innovation. Especially when that state is California, so many of whose inhabitants border on the criminally insane. But there’s no denying it in this case: Californians put Virginians to shame when it comes to pioneering new technologies and market-based strategies for conserving energy.
The latest case in point comes from Silicon Valley, where venture capitalists and entrepreneurs are channeling their creative talents into energy conservation and alternate fuels. The New York Times profiles an initiative by Google (of all companies!) and Pacific Gas & Electric, which have unveiled a “vision of a future in which cars and trucks are partly powered by the country’s electric grids, and vice versa.”
Earlier this week, the companies displayed six Toyota Prius and Ford Escape hybrid vehicles which have been modified to draw power from the electric grid. The vehicles can go up to 75 miles per gallon of gas, double the mph of a regular hybrid. One vehicle also was modified to feed electricity back to the power company.
The advantage of reducing gasoline consumption is evident to all. More subtle is the benefit of two-way electricity flow between automobile batteries and the electric grid. Utilities invest billions of dollars in power plants designed to meet peak energy needs, often burning costly natural gas as a fuel. If power companies could pay automobile owners to extract electricity from the batteries of their parked cars during periods of peak demand, they could dramatically reduce the cost of peak-load electricity.
Where is the General Assembly on energy conservation? Where is the State Corporation Commission? Clearly, Dominion isn’t interested. Ever since pushing the use of electric vehicles a decade or so ago, the power company has been missing in action. Why? Because under the current regulatory structure — and the new one soon to be implemented — conservation doesn’t pay.
(Hat tip to Larry Gross for pointing me to the NYT article.)
