Electric Vehicles Are Here And Electric Jets Are Coming. Should We Fear Electrification Of The Economy?

Electric vehicles are a crucial pathway to carbon neutrality. But electric jets will soon arrive — a manifestation of climate change and society’s quest to find new ways to fuel its transport sector and generate cleaner energy.

Suppose the global community is to avert a climate breakdown. It means using less oil and coal and more wind and solar energy — the electrification of the global economy. But fossil fuels now supply 80% of the world’s energy and will continue to play a part in ensuring an orderly and reliable transition. But we have more to fear from climate change than we do from electrification.

“I think that this will scare people, and it will shock people how fast this (energy transition) is coming but we’ve got to get ahead,” says Jigar Shah, director of the loans program office at the U.S. Department of Energy. “America’s got to be able to do big things again. But it’s hard. Everything’s hard. We have the right people and technology. But how do we go big? How do we move more confidently, and how do we export these solutions to the rest of the world?”

Shah’s comments came during a webcast hosted by the United States Energy Association in which this reporter asked questions. His office’s job is to evaluate promising technologies and provide the initial funds they need to take off: “The private sector is the one who runs this stuff, and we enable it. And so, if we achieve lift-off, we’ve succeeded. If we don’t, then we haven’t.”

The Energy Department’s loan office started with $40 billion, and the Inflation Reduction Act added $100 billion. About half of that money will be targeted to renewable energy and alternatively-fueled vehicles, while the other half will go to carbon capture projects and advanced nuclear designs.

The Energy Department’s most illustrious loan came in 2010 to an upstart called Tesla Motors for $465 million. But Tesla repaid it a decade ahead of schedule. The enterprise now employs thousands. BloombergNEF says that 28% of all new cars will be EVs by 2030, and they will be 58% by 2040.

Importantly, a loan guarantee is not a subsidy. It gets projects off the ground and helps entice Wall Street to invest. The Energy Department had previously awarded $30 billion to 42 alternative energy deals, which returned the principal plus $500 million in interest payments to taxpayers.

“Households are going electric not because of regulation but because it is better,” says Shah. “It’s lowering bills” during a time of high energy prices.

“We want the competition. But eight oil refineries are slated to close over the next two years. Electric vehicles are relieving (oil producers) from the pressure of drilling into some of the hardest places to find oil. You have decline rates every single year. So I don’t think you are seeing as much pushback from the oil and gas sectors as you might think.”

The Sky is the Limit

Electric transportation is transforming surface vehicles. In 2020, there were 48 models, and by 2024, there will be 134. Air travel is a potential market — assisted, in part, by the auto companies. Shah says that aircraft makers have submitted four applications to pursue electric planes, which will be used in tandem with jet fuel to make short flights.

“We haven’t fully evaluated the applications yet, but there’s a lot of interest in electric aircraft,” says Shah.

Take Air Canada, which aims to be net zero by 2050: It has ordered 30 hybrid aircraft from Heart Aerospace — a plane called ES-30. Not only has the airline taken a $5 billion stake but so has MicrosoftMSFT
Corp. founder Bill Gates. It’s part of his Breakthrough Energy Ventures, which is investing in promising eco-friendly technologies. United Airlines is also an investor in Heart and will buy up to 100 electric aircraft from the company.

The plane has an all-electric range of 124 miles — double that if combined with jet fuel. It flies at an altitude of 20,000 feet. The plane will fly to and from regional airports and hold 30 passengers. Four electric motors power the plane, using lithium-ion batteries and two turbo generators that can run on sustainable aviation fuels. It has a charging time of 30 to 50 minutes. Earlier this year, Heart completed a test flight.

“Commercial aviation accounts for about 2%-3% of all global carbon emissions. Air Canada monitors its GHG emissions closely and is committed to mitigating its environmental footprint,” the company says. “As about 99% of the airline’s carbon dioxide emissions are generated from aircraft engine combustion, there is a strong positive correlation between meeting our environmental targets and reducing fuel burn, GHG emissions, and our operating costs.”

Roadmap to Net Zero

Electrification is critical to transportation. But it is also vital to power generation, affecting emission levels and energy costs. Electricity now makes up 20% of all end-use energy consumption in this country. By 2050, however, that could rise to 60% — a number that could cut transportation costs by at least 10%, says the Electric Power Research Institute.

Electrification benefits low-carbon fuels and technologies. That includes renewable energy, which has jumped by 250,000 megawatts over the last decade. But it will also lead to the production of more green hydrogen from wind and solar power. And it will also result in more onsite generation with advanced energy storage and more significant investment in advanced nuclear energy technologies. This fuel comprises half of this country’s carbon-free power.

It’s healthy for the economy too. The United States has reduced its annual energy-related CO2 release by about 1 billion tons since 2005. That represents a 14% reduction even as the U.S. economy grew by 28%. In other words, economic expansion does not need to equate to greater pollution levels. But it still doesn’t obviate the need for reliability and affordability, which means keeping natural gas plants available — even if they only operate during peak periods.

“Electrification is happening in various forms, and we are going to need more electricity, not less as we go forward,” says Jim Matheson, chief executive officer of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, during the webcast. “It’s clearly happening in the transportation sector.”

However, “We’re concerned about reliability, and you need to have always available dispatchable resources to maintain the grid. It can’t be 100% intermittent resources. You must have some form of always-available power” such as nuclear or natural gas. “In a situation where we need more electricity, the question is: how much of the portfolio can come from intermittent resources?”

Utilities have the potential to sell more power. But they walk a fine line. Take NorthwesternNWE
Energy, which sells electricity and natural gas in Montana and South Dakota, and natural gas in Nebraska: it points out that the energy marketplace is idiosyncratic and fuels are often consumed according to the time of day and year.

It emphasizes that natural gas not only firms up wind and solar when the weather is not agreeable, but it also says the industry is deploying the technologies to capture methane emissions, a potent greenhouse gas. Its biggest frustration is the regulatory process, which is slow to approve infrastructure projects.

Unless the transmission network expands, the Wind Energy Foundation says at least 51,000 megawatts of renewable energy could fail to reach the market. Carbon neutrality then becomes wishful thinking.

“Like every transition, it’s messy, and it’s complicated,” says Robert Rowe, chief executive officer of Northwestern Energy, during the symposium. “It takes longer than you thought, but you may have accomplished more when you look back. Much of the world is focused on net zero by 2050. But we must also target reliability and affordability as the got-to-haves, and we cannot do anything to jeopardize that.”

If the goal is carbon neutrality, then the solution is the electrification of the economy. The shift to electric vehicles and potentially electric aircraft for shorter flights highlights the momentum. Notably, the energy transition also includes electric generation, requiring natural gas and battery storage to ensure the lights stay on. With that, the roadmap to net zero is clear — super-charged investment and innovation in promising technologies.