Cottonwood's points are exactly right. I'll add that solar doesn't generate at night which is when most EVs will charge. Imagine a world (maybe 50 years from now) where everyone has solar + EVs. We generate a ton of distributed electricity during the day but then use a ton of electricity at night to charge our EVs. Local storage is the only good solution I can see for this whether it's at the customer location or at the neighborhood or substation level. Fortunately, someone is stepping up in a big way to facilitate exactly that solution (thanks Elon!). Battery storage will keep solar's continued growth viable, stabilizing the grid and defending against the naysayers who can't see past the end of their nose into our inevitable renewable energy future.
- - - Updated - - -
Energy is energy. That "most" that is not electricity could be used to make electricity instead or do lots of other things, no?
Destination solar charging would solve this. Every surface of the destination structures, buildings (between windows, entire roofs), canopies, parking pavement, and street pavement would be covered with solar. Meters would charge car users for energy used. Automatic charing snakes would plug into vehicles without interaction by the users according to user preprogramming settings, and would unplug as soon as the vehicle was unlocked when the customer comes back, and the car would not shift into gear until the snake was safely away. Special lensing on the rough-surface tire-gripping roadways would direct the energy from the roads into the collectors beneath them, and the lenses would be physically built and supported to handle heavy vehicular traffic, vacuumed daily and rinsed weekly (with collection of the rinse water for recycling). Destination charging would definitely solve daytime charging questions. When destination charging fails, home charging with batteries to shift time would work as you mentioned.
Regarding refinery energy from oil refining to gas, the energy gained from burning that oil would no longer be done if the oil wasn't in the refinery to burn, and the process-particular energy transferences which used that oil not only wouldn't happen, but the oil wouldn't be in position for that process to exist in the first place, and the particular processes wouldn't be done (obviously). Plus we don't want to burn oil for energy anyway. Energy not gained from burning the oil during refining would not be otherwise gained by not refining. That's what I'm guessing and I'm almost certainly correct.
- - - Updated - - -
Charging at work doesn't seem too obvious to me. That requires a lot of charging infrastructure to be built in concentrated areas (work parking lots) that doesn't exist today. Every spot would have a charger of some kind. A spot with a broken charger becomes an unused spot. Then there's payment (who pays, how, etc.). I'm not sure any of that is practical.
I find it fascinating that you mention all the same issues I do, and I say "therefore it's possible and easy" and you come to the opposite conclusion.
We have extra people on the planet. Finding more work for them to do and more purposes for them to live to do that work is a good thing, not a bad thing. Solutions that save our planet (pollution mostly) are a good thing, not a nuisance. The only entities that think solutions are a nuisance are old-fashioned corporations, governments, etc., that are vested in broken ways, and hate solutions. Everyone else wants the solutions, is willing to do the work, and can definitely afford the more affordable future options than the less affordable legacy options that are growing cancerous, outdated and expensive.
- - - Updated - - -
Another down side is that people would plug in to start their charge when they arrive at work, typically 8 or 9 am, when solar is still not producing much. They're not going to care enough to schedule the charge for later or they'll just want to have the car charged asap anyhow. The obvious advantage of charging at night is that I'm asleep and there's far less chance I'll need to run out at 2am than at 11am.
The computers can be programmed appropriately. For instance, I arrive at my parking garage at 5:05 AM. It would plug in. At around 10AM, it would start charging it. When I get in to leave at 2:30PM, it stops charging. Then I drive home, arriving at approximately 3:55PM give or take (due to traffic). It has about 1 hour left of charging at home, then no more sunlight. That's a solid 4 hours of direct sun to car right there (possibly more, like 6, if you count non-peak sun).
