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Greene 27 (1:03)
Topic(s): Electric & Hybrid
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Video Transcript

Our existing electric utility system could handle tens of millions of plug-in hybrid vehicles if they would be recharged during off-peak times, such as at night. There's plenty of excess capacity in the electricity system to provide energy to those vehicles during the night or off-peak. The problem would come if people wanted to recharge their vehicles during peak periods, because then we'd have to add new capacity, new generating capacity and that would be expensive and also conceivably increase the difference between peak and off-peak. The great thing would be if people recharged their vehicles at night, and sort of flatten out the demand for electricity so that the electric utilities could operate at a more constant level all the time, instead of having to meet peak demands and then shut down capacity to— during low-demand periods.