photo: green wombat
In another step toward creating an alternative automotive infrastructure, Silicon Valley electric car company Tesla Motors and California utility PG&E said today they will collaborate on developing "smart charging" technology. That will allow cars like Tesla’s forthcoming Roadster to be juiced up by remote control, giving utilities the ability to control when the vehicle is charged, say, when electricity demand is low – and power cheap – or when solar, wind and other renewable energy comes online. Smart charging also lets utilities set the rate of charging to balance power demands on the grid. It’s part of a developing vehicle-to-grid system where one day it’s hoped that electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid cars will be able to transmit power back to the grid when demand peaks to avoid using carbon-spewing power plants. PG&E (PCG) said it anticipates integrating the Tesla smart charging technology into its SmartMeter program, which could give electric car owners a break on their utility bills if they charge their cars at certain times of the day. Other utilities, like Southern California Edison (EIX), are working on similar initiatives.
Tesla and PG&E Team Up
September 12, 2007 by Todd Woody
Green Wombat 
“It’s part of a developing vehicle-to-grid system where one day it’s hoped that electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid cars will be able to transmit power back to the grid when demand peaks to avoid using carbon-spewing power plants. ”
Wouldn’t an internal combustion engine be significantly less efficient than a steam turbine at a power plant?
Seems like we need to get rid of old coal fired power plants and replace them with something more modern and less polluting.