Re: [EVDL] Rebuilding infrastructure (smartly) EVDL

[Bill Woodcock via EV]

> On Oct 6, 2017, at 2:24 PM, Robert Bruninga via EV  wrote:
> I hope that as we help to rebuild the islands and mainland devastated by
> the hurricanes, that we think forward how we rebuild smartly.

Coincidentally, in connection with my day-job, I’m one of the commissioners on 
the “Commission on Caribbean Communications Resilience,” which is doing a 
Space-Shuttle-Challenger-Commision-style analysis of the telecoms failure 
that’s left three countries completely offline.

So, yes, there’s some attention being paid to the long term, even as the 
immediate needs of the refugees are also being attended to.

It’s kind of heartbreaking to have to choose between short-term and long-term 
in these situations.

-Bill




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Re: [EVDL] Rebuilding infrastructure (smartly) EVDL

[EVDL Administrator via EV]

I agree that it might be better for Puerto Rico to not spend too much trying 
to restore their poorly maintained, fragile grid, and go straight to 
investing in distributed generation.  

For decades PREPA (the state-owned PR electric utility) resisted using 
anything but fuel oil and a little coal.  They started switching a few 
plants to NG less than a decade ago (2010?).  Finally in the last few years 
they've brought some wind and PV online too.  They have new 4 PV farms that 
just started producing about a year ago.

I visited western and northwestern PR for 2 weeks in August, just before 
Irma hit.  In that time I saw exactly zero, zip, zilch EVs anywhere.  I saw 
no Leaves, no Volts, no Bolts, no Teslas -- none.  I'm sure that it doesn't 
help that PR's average cost per kWh is 20 cents. Some people reportedly pay 
close to 30 cents per kWh.  

I asked a few people I met if they had considered PV.  Some had, mostly as 
backup power.  FWIW, the little hotel we stayed at did a fair bit of its 
outdoor lighting with small solar powered garden lights, which were 
impressively capable.

One of the people I spoke with told me that PREPA actually wanted to charge 
them a monthly fee to have an OFF-GRID system, which makes no sense to me. I 
haven't been able to corroborate that.

In any case, PR could definitely use a PV / EV boost.  

However, I suspect that this level of storm is the "new normal" for the 
island. They can probably expect to keep getting category 3-4-5 hurricanes. 

Do PV mounts exist that can withstand 160mph+ hurricane winds?  How do the 
panels themselves handle having large, heavy things thrown at them by those 
same winds?

David Roden - Akron, Ohio, USA
EVDL Administrator

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