Honest answers about electricity supply... We are going to need about 30 site C's (according to CleanBC plan the government is expecting to increase consumption by 60 %)... to meet demand, and will need major infrastructure upgrades to supply the buildings/cars.
LED lighting will save some energy, but heat pumps will substantially increase load (since in many cases this will be a fuel switch from oil, gas, or propane to electric). On the building front, we are looking to add load through fuel switching space heating, domestic hot water, and ventilation... Each one of these sources is stretching the supply to individual buildings (LED lighting savings may just allow for that load to be added to buildings).
Heat pumps will also lead to a new peak in electricity consumption in the summer due to added cooling load. Also, Heat pump efficiency plummets in the winter and reaches a COP of 1 at around zero degrees. So yes... Heat pumps are going to add demand.
The electricity grid also needs to be looked at on different levels, i.e. building, street, block, muni, entire province... as we electrify, we are running into constraints on the building, and block level. These constraints are adding to the business case for electrifying buildings.. In many cases, upgrading the building and street circuits are ruining the business case for fuel switching. We are also running into municipal constraints, with BC Hydro looking to reduce demand in a few lower mainland municipalities (Hope for one).
The reality is we need to be very careful with the energy we consume!
