CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Despite declines from recent highs, gas prices are still very high. Now some Americans are thinking about going electric.
But with that curiosity comes new claims.
THE QUESTION
If more people in the U.S. owned an electric vehicle, would the grid be able to handle that demand for electricity?
THE SOURCES
THE ANSWER
Yes, if more people in the U.S. owned an electric vehicles, the grid would be able to handle the demand for electricity.
WHAT WE FOUND
It turns out power companies like Duke Energy are already looking forward and anticipating what's coming down the pike for everything energy-related.
It's no different with electric vehicles.
"We know that we're going to have to invest more in our grid because that's a big load coming," Wheeless said. "We need to invest in our grid to make sure we can handle that in the future."
Wheeless said Duke Energy is putting up solar farms to meet expected demand as more electric cars show up on the road.
"We also have a great nuclear fleet, natural gas, hydro-pump storage," Wheeless said. "We have all kinds of energy sources in North Carolina that we think we can handle that loan when electric vehicles really start to take off."
Both Cross and Wheeless said electric car owners do a majority of their charging at night when there isn't a big stress on the grid anyway.
"There is an abundance of energy that's unused on the electrical grid at night, when 80% of all EV charging happens," Cross said. "And that's plenty of power to charge the country's EVs if we were all driving one."
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