By ANDY ANDREWSWorld Futures Institute
In Part Two of this series we examined the increase of household electricity costs if all carbon-based and nuclear power was converted to wind and solar. Not included were the costs to the household for eliminating carbon-based transportation.
In exploring the aspect of personal transportation I decided to use my 2003 Ford Ranger truck as a base point. Per autotrader.com, my truck was priced at about $14,000 in 2003 (about $23,000 in today’s money) and it got between 15 and 29 miles per gallon of gasoline, depending on city or highway driving. The 2019 Ford Ranger is now a bigger truck, starts selling at $24,000 and has fuel consumption ranging between 20 and 26 miles per gallon. Even though my Ranger is 16 years old and has over 200,000 miles on it, it still does the job, keeps running, and does okay in the cost of gasoline per mile. While I would like a new truck, I cannot justify the expense; $24,000 spread over 60 months without interest is $400 per month.
Consider the impact of banning all gas burning trucks. In looking for electric trucks I found two. The first is the Tesla truck, yet to be fully disclosed, and available with a rumored price of $49,000. The second is the Rivian R 1 truck with a starting price of $90,000. This gives a payment range for a 60 month interest free loan of $810 to $1150 per month. But think of all the money that can be saved using electricity.
In 2010, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) introduced a miles per gallon equivalent (MPGe) rating comparing electric powered or assisted vehicles to gasoline powered only. In simple terms one gallon of gasoline can provide the same power as 33.7 kilowatt-hours (kWh) electricity. If you determine how far a vehicle can travel on 33.7 kWh, you have determined the MPGe of the vehicle. If the distance is 100 miles, at 12 cents per kWh the cost is $4.04. Now consider my truck at 25 miles per gallon of gasoline. It takes four gallons of gasoline to go 100 miles, costing $10.00 at $2.50 per gallon. Electricity, at today’s prices, is cheaper.
But I own my truck and can refuel quickly at the gas station. How long does recharging take, where can I do it, what is the range of the vehicle, and how much does the charging station charge?
Consider the 2019 Chevy Bolt, not a truck but all electric and priced at $36,620. That comes to about $620 per month for five years and zero interest. It has a range of 259 miles and an MPGe of 120 for city driving and 110 for the highway. As a household, your power costs per month for “getting around” should drop by 75 percent. Using 1000 miles per month and 30 miles per gallon of gasoline, you could save $62.50 per month. That is pretty good for a $50,000 per year household income. You “save” $750 in energy costs per year for a payment of only $610 per month. And if you need two vehicles per household the power savings would double.
Switching to electrically powered transportation is not bad in and of itself, but it will take time. In 1886, Karl Benz patented the Benz Patent-Motorwagen. In 1908, 22 years later, one could but a Model T Ford. The adoption of technology bysociety is a slow process because of costs to the user and the presence of operational infrastructure.Consider the distribution of stuff. We all need groceries, clothes, pens and pencils, and on and on. These “stuffs” must be distributed from central locations like the manufacturing plant or corn field to you at another central location. The three major ways of moving the stuff are truck, rail, and barge and combinations thereof. The power required is measured in British Thermal Units (BTUs) for ton miles, or the power to move one ton of cargo one mile. Truck shipping requires four to five times the power consumption of rail and barge. Obviously, if you do not live next to a large body of water, barge shipping is out.
In 2017, shipping in New Mexico consumed 14,730,092 BTUs with almost 96 percent via truck. Clearly the solution is to convert to electric powered trucks
and electric rail. If you are the truck shipper, you need to buy new trucks that cost between $150 and $180 thousand each, requiring a raise in what you charge your customer per ton-mile. And while your trucks may all have a 500 mile range, where can they recharge and how long does it take?
Why not switch to rail for shipping since it is more efficient? Forget about the investments made in the Interstate Highway System. Unfortunately, rail needs infrastructure that can deliver power via the rails. Obviously it can be done, just consider the various subway systems in many cities. For shipping, however, you
need systems that stretch hundreds of miles. And this means more money from the consumer through the increased cost of stuff or from the government (that charges the citizens) to build and maintain the infrastructure. And what about the increased demand on the electrical power industry and the impact of converting to electricity on sales of local, non-electric energy sources?
Til next time….
The Los Alamos World Futures Institute web site is at LAWorldFutures.org. Feedback, volunteers, and donations (501.c.3) are welcome. If you prefer to email us, please use andy.andrews@laworldfutres.org or bob.nolen@laworldfutures.org. Previously published articles can be found at https://ladailypost.com or https:////www.laworldfutures.org.
