Every year, one of my favorite business trips — yes, I have a job outside being mayor — is the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, where companies from across the globe gather to showcase their new visions, developments, and enhancements to our rapidly changing world. Every year, but especially this year, I walked away from the show really thinking about how our borough is going to meet the needs of residents soon and what we need to invest in now to make that a reality.
The first, and most rapidly shifting dynamic that we will need to face as a community is the changes in mobility. Specifically, the shift to EV cars and electric bikes/scooters. At CES, two major car manufacturers committed to producing a 100% EV line-up of vehicles by 2028, with others suggesting they would be in the same place by the end of the decade. Even if the car manufacturers miss that mark, it is likely that within the next 10 years they will produce 80% of their selection as EV only.
As an electric authority, this rapid shift toward EV’s poses a huge challenge for us. Charging a single EV car with a level two charger is nearly the same electrical draw as running everything in your house all at once. With most residents living in single family homes, and another large chunk living in apartments where they will likely invest in chargers for their residents to use, we will see a massive increase in power consumption over the next decade. We will need to start fortifying and upgrading our electrical infrastructure to meet the power demands of this coming change.
In addition, there will likely be more level three chargers — so-called “fast chargers” — that power up a car in 30 mins or so, to build out a gas-station style recharging point. This will require the re-sale of power and will require us to think dynamically about how we will maintain an electrical grid that can meet the demands of five to 10 level three charging stations all being used concurrently in the same space and the possibility that there are multiple locations operating that way.
Coming with the shift to EV cars, obviously, comes the need to either buy or generate more power for people to use for these devices and cars. Buying more power means higher fees for transmitting power. As I have noted in prior articles, transmission fees are a huge portion of our purchase power agreement and are simply a revenue source for the power generation companies.
To build a more resilient, reliable, and economical Lansdale Borough, we must generate more power in the borough. It is that simple. By generating more power locally, we will save on transmission fees and must purchase less power in total due to there being less loss in the line as the power does not have to transfer over long distances. It is unlikely that we will be able to make all the power we need in the borough, but every dedicated space to green power production has the opportunity to become more efficient over time as green technology, specifically solar panels, improves.
To be clear, this electrical grid and power challenge is not an if — it is a when. The time to begin considering how we will manage it is now so that we are properly prepared to respond to it. In the electric committee next month, we will be reviewing, considering, and discussing how Willow Park might help us generate more green power. Additionally, it is possible that the Wastewater Treatment Plant could be used to harness methane to turn into reusable power through a process called anaerobic digestion.
Over the next several years we must explore these challenges forthrightly and dedicate ourselves toward action. If we do not take the time to build some of the infrastructure we need now, we will be scrambling to react to the future as it comes at us. We can proactively mold our future before we get to that point and I believe Lansdale will be better long into the future for building the infrastructure of the future, today.
(Mayoral Musings is a weekly op-ed column submitted to North Penn Now, courtesy of Lansdale Borough Mayor Garry Herbert. The views expressed are his own.)
See also:
Mayoral Musings: 2023 Infrastructure
Mayoral Musings: Goals and Objectives for 2023
Mayoral Musings: Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
Mayoral Musings: Attacks on Local Drag Queen’s Employment Another Example of ‘Otherism’
