Abstract

California aims to replace gasoline and diesel light-duty vehicles (LDVs) with zero-emission LDVs, many of which will be plug-in battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and achieve 100% zero-carbon electricity by 2045. Large-scale plug-in BEV deployment will substantially increase electricity demand, particularly during peak hours (4:00pm to 9:00pm) when renewable energy is in short supply. Popular strategies for charging BEVs with electricity produced from renewable energy include smart charging and creating more energy storage that soaks up renewable energy during the day and dispenses it later when needed. These strategies, however, may not be enough. Consumer acceptance limits smart charging, and increased energy storage capacity is expensive. Another potential strategy involves lowering the overall demand for electricity by shifting BEV trips to electric-powered bicycles (e-bikes). While e-bikes cannot entirely replace BEV trips, they are ideal for short trips (five miles or less). Currently, 64% of US vehicle trips fall into the short trip category. Using synthetic travel pattern data from the San Diego region, we quantified the electric grid cost savings of shifting future BEV trips to e-bikes. For our analysis, we determined the passenger LDV trips that e-bikes could potentially replace. To provide an upper bound on replaceable trips, we considered trips that met the following criteria: LDV trips within home-based tours (a sequence of trips starting and ending at the home location) made by no more than two household members (between 16 and 70 years old), with less than five stops, under four hours in travel duration, and with individual trip distances up to seven miles long. We also created three scenarios that differ in terms of the tour purposes:
• Scenario 1: All purposes (e.g., work, recreation, eating out, etc.) except escort (i.e., transporting someone else to their activity) and shopping tours
• Scenario 2: All purposes except escort tours
• Scenario 3: All purposes