By Wouter de Heij, January 19, 2020, Translated from Dutch

Electric Driving? I Made a Slight Mistake, but Maarten Steinbuch Was a Bit Too Optimistic

Two weeks ago, I gave a brief analysis of our home and the ambition to go “off gas.” Rationally, I know our house doesn’t need to go off gas entirely, but it remains an interesting project to see how far we can electrify. What is most challenging when it comes to a home:

1. The seasonal variations in heating demands for your home (in summer, lots of PV electricity production but no demand at home, while in winter, a heat pump demands lots of electricity, but PV production is low).
2. Driving. For a regular home, it’s not feasible to generate enough electricity on your own property to charge an electric car. With our annual mileage, I’d need at least 50 additional solar panels (and maybe more).
3. Covering all electrical needs (including cooking and hot water) is achievable with our own PV installation. So, that’s something positive to report: apart from our car mileage, we’re about 65–75% climate neutral, and with a heat pump soon almost 100%. That seems like a decent result to me. It does cost quite a bit of money, though.

In recent days, I got into some discussions with Maarten Steinbuch (often called the Tesla professor). He is optimistic—which is a great trait—but perhaps a bit too optimistic about the future of electric driving in the Netherlands. These discussions arose on LinkedIn and on my Facebook timeline. I don’t have much time, but I’d like to share some of my findings here.

First, Maarten Steinbuch’s Article

What you can see is that our assumptions are roughly the same. My “beer coaster” calculation was: 13,000 km per year per household. There are 8 million households, making a total of 100 billion car kilometers per year. Divided by 15 (1:15), that equals 7 billion liters of gasoline, or a total of 70 billion kWh. (On average, 9,000 kWh per household per year). For 100% electric driving, an additional 15 GW of electricity production would be needed in the Netherlands (or imported).

Maarten Steinbuch, in his article, assumes 9 million households and 13,000 km, totaling 121 billion car kilometers. He calculates with 1:12 and 10 kWh per liter, and through his calculations arrives at 100 billion kWh (28 GW) for car mileage based on 10 billion liters of fuel. Our assumptions differ slightly; I assume cars are a bit more fuel-efficient at 1:14, but Maarten correctly uses the number of cars rather than households to multiply by 13,000 km per year. That’s where I went wrong.

So, my assumptions should have been: 13,000 km/car/year x 9,000,000 cars ÷ 15 = 8 billion liters of fuel per year or 80 billion kWh for transport. For simplicity, I’ll assume somewhere between 80 and 100 billion kWh (22 to 28 GW of electric power).

For Comparison

In the entire Netherlands, annual electricity consumption is 125 billion kWh (equivalent to 35 GW). In my original calculation, I used an additional 15 GW for cars, where it should have been 80/100 × 35 = 28 GW (extra electricity = 80% more). Maarten rightly noted that electric cars are ultimately much more efficient. He’s correct about that too.

Efficiency and Energy Sources

A quick online analysis shows that a fully electric car consumes between 15 and 17 kWh per 100 km. Maarten calculates 200 Wh/km, or 20,000 Wh per 100 km (20 kWh/100 km). That 200 Wh/km matches the typical consumption of a Tesla Model S.

If all cars in the Netherlands were fully electric from now on (magic!): 121 billion km/year x 150–200 Wh/km = 18–24 billion kWh/year. That corresponds to about 5–7 GW (an extra electricity consumption of +14% to +19%), and in practice, it’s likely closer to 7 GW, or even 8–10 GW extra.

Three Scenarios

1. Gasoline Cars (Petroleum-Based Transport):
   • Efficiency of combustion engine: 40%
   • Efficiency of oil refining to gasoline: 85%
   • Overall efficiency: 40% × 85% = 34%
   • Required energy: ~72 billion kWh (or the 100 billion kWh calculated by Steinbuch).
2. Electric Cars (Powered by Gas-Fired Power Plants):
   • Efficiency of electric motor: 95%
   • Efficiency of gas-to-electricity: 60%
   • Overall efficiency: 60% × 95% = 57%
   • Required energy: ~42 billion kWh.
3. Electric Cars (Powered by PV/Wind):
   • Efficiency of electric motor: 95%
   • Overall efficiency: 95%
   • Required energy: 18–24 billion kWh.

Key Takeaway

My position—and the reason I’m writing this so deliberately—is that we’ll need a lot more electricity production in the Netherlands. Not just for electric driving, but also for households. This means no transition from gas and coal power plants to solely PV/wind/etc. No, we need MUCH more capacity due to the transition from gas/oil to electric systems.

We’ll need extra wind turbines and PV systems (2–5 GW), extra nuclear plants (2–4 GW), and extra gas-fired power plants (4–8 GW) in the coming decades. Specifically for driving, we’ll need an additional capacity of 7–12 GW (we currently have 35 GW in the Netherlands, so that’s 20–34% more for transport).

But is this a problem? Absolutely not. Electrification will result in far less CO₂ emissions (40–70% reduction in household car transport), less oil refining, and significantly reduced particulate matter, NOₓ, and other pollutants. Even in scenario two (gas-fired power plants), it’s a major improvement for the Netherlands. In short, I remain a strong advocate of electrifying our vehicle fleet.

The Challenges

Yes, there are challenges:

• Who will pay for these power plants?
• Which citizens can afford an EV?
• Where will we source the specialized metals for batteries? (To be clear: hydrogen won’t be the solution!)

The growth in electricity production for transport must align with the introduction of EVs (currently 1.6% of the fleet). It will take at least 15 (by 2035) to 25 years (by 2050) before we reach 100% electric driving. I conclude that we must NOT close power plants (not even coal plants right now). The irony is that we first need MORE capacity, and later, with 100% electrification, we seem to need slightly less.osts and challenges. By embracing these changes, we can achieve a cleaner, more sustainable future.