V2X: Things to do when your EV's plugged in

On the amazing potential of Vehicle-To-Grid/Home/Load

Welcome to My Next Electric’s weekly newsletter on the clean energy transition, specifically the electrification of traditionally fossil-fueled stuff.

If you were forwarded this post and liked it, please subscribe! Each week we cover one of these:

1. Investments: a company we’ve invested in and why,

2. Motonerd stuff: hunches about the future of vehicles, or

3. Learning science: ways to help all humans learn, then go, electric.

After a few weeks on category 1 posts, it’s motonerd time.

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I’m a #motonerd: driving, modding, accessorizing. Especially accessorizing. Now that I’m driving mostly electric stuff, I’ve added plugging stuff in to that list.

And I’m all about it.

My electric truck has an electric cooler and an electric bike plugged in 24/7 unless I’m doing, you know, truck stuff.

There’s a fancy acronym for plugging stuff in to electric vehicles: V2X. As in Vehicle To Anything.

That’s right; this topic is so new — and potentially so big — that your middle school nemesis, the variable X, has burrowed into this acronym like an angry honey badger.

But there’s good reason to think big about this topic. Did you know that most electric vehicles have enough energy to run a house for a week? Or that sipping power from even a small percentage of electric cars plugged in to the power grid could solve that pesky duck curve issue we covered a few posts ago — for everyone?

V2X: “Things you can do when you’re electric vehicle’s plugged in”

One of my favorite podcasts, Catalyst with Shayle Kann, just dropped a terrific episode with one of the only people in the world with V2X in their job title, General Motor’s Ty Jagerson. It’s a great intro to this fascinating topic, and Ty does a great job making this topic real. Unlike many folks just talking about this, Ty’s running actual V2X pilots with real GM drivers.

Here’s the sketch I drew while I was listening.

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Take a listen to the full podcast here.

And keep your eyes peeled for a deeper dive into V2X soon; it’s one of the biggest ideas we’re tracking at My Next Electric!