I'm not worried about this.

First of all, it will take decades to get significant number of people on plug-in hybrids. That gives us a lot of time to upgrade our grid and build more and better power plants (I favor significantly building out our wind and solar capacity backed up with nuclear for the base load).

Secondly, there's no reason that plug in hybrids need to charge during peak hours. Indeed, they will be outfitted with sophisticated computers. Why not program them to charge only during off-peak times? In fact, if we created a "smart grid" plug in hybrids could monitor the spot rate for electricity and charge only during the low cost periods, while giving back electricity to the grid when it is profitable to do so.

Finally, there is no reason why you can't combine the most efficient internal combustion engine with a plug in hybrid, creating an even more efficient car.

I haven't a clue where the idea that the grid can only support 10 million vehicles came from. Every study has
made it quite clear that the grid can currently support vritually the entire US car fleet of 250 million vehicles,
as long as they don't try to recharge at peak demand hours, an extremely unlikely event, given the far better electric rates that will be availble during the overnight hours. The calculations of today's gasoline usage, produxing miles travelled, then estimating the number of mWhrs required provides mu best estimate of around 17% of current capacity would be required. That capacity is easily available during the nighttime hours (in almost every jurisdiction) which is when electric cars will be recharged. Prviding electricity for electric cars is the least of our problems, and the idea that all of a sudden 250 million electric cars will appear on our roads is totally brainless. It will take many years for that to happen. It's unlikely that the extra demand during the first few years would even be noticed. There is way more than enough time to build the few extra power plants that EVs would require. Lack of electricity is a phoney argument. What we do have is a lack of gasoline right now.

Electric cars have been with us since the beginning of the automobile - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_electric_vehicle - if there's any trust in engineering breakthroughs and market forces - then we'd all _already_ be driving an electric plugin vehicle. Instead, for all its inefficiencies we have gazillions of internal combustion, gasoline vehicles.

Feels like it'd be easier and cheaper to simply make our existing cars lighter and stronger than boil the ocean with the infrastructure changes necessary to support a plug-in electric world.

I have to agree that this post does come off somewhat crazy.
I get a very 'Current Affairs' feel from it (Australian 'news' program prone to sensationalized stories)
Linking to a forum post to back up you ideas does not help.

The 'green-sciens' posts always seem random in a blog I have filed under UCM.
Not that I don't mind them; when they are attached to a detailed news report.
Just not enough info here for us visitors who have not researched the topic.

I would want some hard stats say; elec car sales VS. production VS. demand.
No one should get away with 'assuming' anything from a forum. If anything it becomes a discussion piece, not an statement. It may well be their job, but do they control/monitor Every part of Americas Entire grid or is it a localized problem they are referring to?

@alan: thanks for the correction, I included it above

@tyro: I tag all my posts, and have different RSS feeds for each. If you only want UCM, go here: http://bexhuff.com/topic/technology/oracle-enterprise-content-management

@Domenick: thanks for the link, I included it above, but that study isn't as rosy as you say...

Just found this site looking for info on upgrading the electric grid. So here are some thoughts.
1.) I believe that 70% of our oil imports go to transportation (cars, trucks, gas, diesel, etc.). The Average lifespan of an auto is 16+ years.
2.) Electric propulsion won't work for everything, probably not big trucks and definitely not airplanes. But there are a lot of cars!
3.) If we start transitioning to electric cars, it will probably take 10-20 years for the majority of the fleet to be electric. This will immediately impact our dependence on imported oil decreasing it over the entire period. It also cuts down on pollution and creation of greenhouse gases.
4.) Following Al Gore's lead in his just announce initiative, we start on massive campaign to replace the current generating capacity of the US with all renewable sources (solar, wind, geothermal, etc). I might expect the curve of this build out to match the increase in demand created by the electric fleet. Some of the newer, cleaner existing power plants can be left in the mix till near the end of the 20 yr. period to provide extra capacity for the grid. This effort also helps curb GHG emissions of which the coal burning power plants are a major source.
5.) Since we can expect that the wind resources of the upper Great Plains and the solar resources of the SW will become generation centers, but distant areas like the NE are the consumption areas, we investigate the possibility of creating a national superconducting backbone across country.
6.) The country gets a huge economic boost from the increased infrastructure spending, similar to what happened over 20+ years as the Interstate Highway system was built in the 50's -70's.
7.) The high demand for electric technology (batteries, motors, controllers, etc.) becomes an economy driver in the 21st century the way computers where in 90's.
8.) All of our new technology becomes exportable to the rest of the world.

So, we have just solved global warming, energy independence, trade imbalances, and economic malaise all in one fell swope and we can start work on world peace.

A solution to a delicate electric grid is to promote individual power generation (IPG). Imagine a solar panel and a small wind generator on every rooftop contributing to the electric grid. Energy wasted on rooftops could be use to feed the grid at many points. This way you could feed your neighborhood power when a surplus conditions exists and get paid for it. Just a thought.

I don't think that this is simply about what is the best solution on the pollution front.

It's about security and putting the energy decisions back into our hands. While the electric car is not perfect, assuming we an get 40 miles per charge (likely 50-80% of the average persons daily driving) and you could build a car that would support both gasolline and natural gas you have fully diversified your fueling options. Without diversity in fueling, you are at the hands of whomever owns the single fuel you rely on. How much defense money could we save every year and the pollution caused by all of their manuevers, if we didn;t need to protect our energy interests in the middle east?

Here is a study by Xcel energy and NREL and they also do not seem to support what you are reading from the power plant engineers.

http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy07osti/41410.pdf

So, the only shorter term (5-10 years) option that would make huge strides in reducing our depedence on a single fuel would be electric. Electric is also the only way to incorporate purely green solutions like wind and solar.