Oregon Public Broadcasting

A regional agency that manages electricity in the Northwest is trying to figure out how to adjust the power grid to an influx of electric cars.

The Northwest Power and Conservation Council heard testimony on the issue Tuesday in Coeur d’Alene. Correspondent Doug Nadvornick reports.

Michael Kintner-Meyer has been studying how the new wave of plug-in electric vehicles will shock the power supply.

He’s a research scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland. He told power council members that if three-quarters of the nation’s cars, trucks and vans were magically transformed today into plug-in electric vehicles, the current grid would be able to charge them.

But Kintner-Meyer says many utilities worry that if everyone plugs their electric cars in at the same time at night, the demand for power could overwhelm the grid.

Michael Kintner-Meyer: “When is the load showing up on the grid? When do we need to serve the load?”

Kintner-Meyer says his lab is working with the auto industry and utilities to develop what he calls “smart chargers.”

Those are home electric car outlets that utilities could control.

That way they could interrupt the flow of electricity if that power was needed elsewhere. He says those may be ready for the market in a few years.