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At first glance, this report on TCD (The CoolDown) is a
heartwarming tale of good people stepping in to save hard-done-by citizens. The report says "Tesla's Powerwall 3 is now available in power-poor
Puerto Rico ..."
What I take away from this story is, however, slightly different.
Puerto Rico has horrific power supply and distribution problems, caused by lack of investment and regular damage by hurricanes. In 2017 the island was hit by the double
whammy of hurricane Irma and hurricane Maria, leaving 95% of Puerto Rico without power, 95% without cell phone service and 44% without tap water. What is noteworthy is:
- Tesla is not giving the Powerwalls to the island's residents, nor even offering them at significant discounts (although the US government does
offer some tax breaks). So the TCD article is just a marketing exercise.
- It has been over 7 years since hurricanes Irma and Maria, and the electricity infrastructure is still not fixed. The US has an aid programme,
FEMA, intended to provide aid when disasters like wildfires, earthquakes and hurricanes strike, but it seems
that Puerto Rico has only spent $1.8 billion of the $23.4 billion it was awarded for relief for the 2017 hurricanes and the 2019 and 2020 earthquakes (see
here).
This seems to suggest simple laziness and incompetence by the island's government.
It should be noted that Puerto Rico is not the only part of the US with infrastructure problems:
- Many states have unreliable (with failures caused by high winds and extreme heat and cold) and inadequate (i.e. not able to cope with increased demand for
charging electric vehicles) power distribution networks, most notably Texas (see the graph to the right).
- All states have problems with undrinkable tap water (remember Flint, Michigan?). This web-site has an interactive map showing the scale of the problem (24,525 violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act in 2023).
- For a nation which drives so much, and loves a road trip, America's roads are in a dire state. Ask anyone who has been there. I have driven on worse
roads, but that was 45 years ago in New Zealand, where the quality of roads has since vastly improved.
- The standard of housing in the US is a disaster. Much of the US housing stock comprises wooden houses, so it is no wonder they are destroyed by tornadoes
and floods, and rot away in typically less than 100 years. As I write this in my German house with double insulated walls 2 feet thick, I know
that Sheryl's family's houses in Chicago use vastly more energy to heat in winter and cool in summer than mine. This house is over 100 years old, has survived an
allied bomb in WWII, and is still in good order. It would not be possible to get planning permission to build a typical US house here in Germany, because
the building codes are so much stricter.
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