Tech
If every US home and personal vehicle goes electric, power outages could spike unless key measures are taken
A future where all homes and vehicles in the U.S. are fully electrified could overwhelm power supply and risk outages unless key upgrades are made, says a new study conducted by Purdue University engineers. But a few strategies could cut two-thirds of the potential costs of reinforcing the nation’s distribution grid to handle this demand.
Electrifying would mean switching a home’s heating system from a boiler to a heat pump and transitioning from gas- or diesel-fueled vehicles to electric vehicles.
“If we install a whole bunch of new electric heating systems for homes and use more electric vehicles and electric water heaters, then we’re going to increase electricity demand a lot. And that’s basically going to require putting in thicker wires, bigger transformers and other infrastructure into the power grid,” said Kevin Kircher, a Purdue assistant professor of mechanical engineering and faculty member in the university’s Ray W. Herrick Laboratories. “And if that happens, utilities will pass the cost of those upgrades to us, the customers.”
The study, published in Cell Reports Sustainability on Sept. 16, found that reinforcing the U.S. distribution grid, which provides power to residential areas, could cost $350–$790 billion—about $2,000–$6,400 total per household between now and 2050. Much of this cost would be due to increased electric space heating, with the coldest regions of the U.S. experiencing electricity demand peaks up to five times higher than today’s peaks.
But taking measures such as installing better insulation and air sealing, improving equipment efficiency, and coordinating the operation of the home’s electric devices could mitigate the costs of upgrading the grid.
An example of boosting the efficiency of a home’s electrical equipment would be using ground-source heat pumps instead of air-source heat pumps, because the constant ground temperature reduces the energy needed to heat and cool homes. Coordinating the home’s electrical device operation could mean adjusting when the home’s electric vehicle charges so that it doesn’t happen at the same time as the heat pump is in use.
“If electric vehicles could communicate with the heating, ventilation and air conditioning units that we install in the house, and if they can coordinate when they have to charge or when they have to heat or precool the homes, this strategy could contribute to a 40% decrease in grid reinforcement costs,” said Priyadarshan, a Ph.D. student in Purdue’s School of Mechanical Engineering and the first author of this paper.
“Let’s say there’s a cold snap coming. The heat pump could preheat the house, and the home’s electric vehicles could be charged at a different time to reduce strain on the grid.”
The study focused on each county of the Lower 48 U.S. states. The researchers modeled the grid impacts of fully electrifying homes and vehicles using public surveys of home electricity usage and electric vehicle travel where available for each county, specifications from equipment manufacturers, building code guidelines, and weather data. The team also calibrated the home data against a fully electrified test house in West Lafayette called the DC Nanogrid House.
After analyzing the impact of full electrification on the distribution grid, the researchers adjusted the parameters of their model to include the home weatherization and equipment efficiency strategies they were proposing to cut grid upgrade costs. For their strategy to coordinate electric device operation, they used an optimization algorithm to take into consideration heating, electricity demand and electric vehicle usage and devise an optimal solution for when to charge the vehicles and how hard to run the heat pumps.
Other studies have investigated the future of increased home and vehicle electrification in the U.S. but not on the scale of residential areas by county nationwide.
“On the one hand, it’s kind of scary—if we electrify everything, we might have a crazy expensive future. But on the other hand, if we electrify in a smart way, then we don’t have nearly as many of those problems,” Kircher said.
More information:
Priyadarshan et al, Distribution Grids May Be a Barrier to Residential Electrification, Cell Reports Sustainability (2025). DOI: 10.1016/j.crsus.2025.100518. www.cell.com/cell-reports-sust … 2949-7906(25)00214-9
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If every US home and personal vehicle goes electric, power outages could spike unless key measures are taken (2025, September 16)
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The US Food and Drug Administration today approved a pill version of the blockbuster anti-obesity drug Wegovy. Made by Novo Nordisk, the pill is taken once a day. The company’s original version of Wegovy is a weekly injection. Both drugs contain the same active ingredient, semaglutide.
“This allows patients with obesity who want to lose weight to have a choice between a once weekly injection or a daily tablet,” says Martin Holst Lange, chief scientific officer at Novo Nordisk.
With the soaring popularity of injectable GLP-1 drugs for weight loss, Novo Nordisk and other pharmaceutical companies have been racing to make effective pill versions that could be preferable for some patients. These drugs mimic a naturally occurring hormone in the body that acts on the brain and gut to promote a feeling of fullness.
In clinical trial results published in the New England Journal of Medicine, participants who took the pill achieved an average weight loss of 13.6 percent by 64 weeks. Nearly 30 percent of people lost 20 percent or more of their weight. The study also showed improvements in cardiovascular disease risk and physical activity levels similar to the injectable version.
While pills can sometimes be a more convenient option, patients may not always take them as prescribed, making them less effective. The clinical trial investigators estimated that in an ideal scenario where participants take the pill every day as prescribed, weight loss would be 16.6 percent—which is similar to results seen with injectable Wegovy.
Novo Nordisk first won approval for an oral semaglutide, sold under the brand name Rybelsus, in 2019 to treat type 2 diabetes. That drug has never been approved for obesity and is not as effective for weight loss as newer GLP-1 medications. The Wegovy pill is essentially a higher-dose version of Rybselsus.
“The efficacy for the obesity pill at the end of the day is driven by dose. Higher doses are required to achieve full weight-loss potential for obesity,” Lange says. The Wegovy pill is 25 milligrams while Rybelsus is 14 milligrams.
The most common side effects of oral Wegovy include nausea and vomiting, which are also side effects of the injectable version.
Novo has not disclosed the exact timeline for the drug’s launch, but Lange says it will be available sometime in the first few months of 2026. Production of the medication is already underway at Novo Nordisk’s US manufacturing sites, and the company expects to have enough of the drug to meet US demand.
The first thing to think about is how you’re going to drain the water from the dehumidifier. In the basement, the best thing you can do is to use the dehumidifier’s continuous water drain tube to either the sump pump or a drain. If those options are not available, you might be emptying the tank multiple times a day. The first time I put a dehumidifier in the basement, the tank was filled in three hours’ time. It’s all about the drainage. Also, knowing how to read a label. If you have a 50-pint humdidifier that means the appliance can remove 50 pints of moisture from the air in a 24-hour period; it’s not the internal tank capacity. Also, look for the maximum area coverage. For example, the Honeywell Smart 50 pint can remove 50 pints of water from 4,000 sq ft—the size of a whole house—in 24 hours.
If you, like me, also need a dehumidifier in your city apartment, then consider buying one that’s easy to move around with wheels and a handle. Some of these machines are heavy. Also, a small dehumidifier in the bathroom is a good idea to keep the dampness at bay, especially if you have mold growing on your grout.
Lastly, do not drink the water collected in your dehumidifier tank. That water is not potable. Pour it down the drain. A dehumidifier is not creating distilled water; that’s a different process and appliance.
Over the weekend, the Justice Department released three new data sets comprising files related to Jeffrey Epstein. The DOJ had previously released nearly 4,000 documents prior to the Friday midnight deadline required by the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
As with Friday’s release, the new tranche appears to contain hundreds of photographs, along with various court records pertaining to Epstein and his associates. The first of the additional datasets, Data Set 5, is photos of hard drives and physical folders, as well as chain-of-custody forms. Data Set 6 appears to mostly be grand jury materials from cases out of the Southern District of New York against Epstein and his coconspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell. Data Set 7 includes more grand jury materials from those cases, as well as materials from a separate 2007 Florida grand jury.
Data Set 7 also includes an out-of-order transcript between R. Alexander Acosta and the DOJ’s Office of Professional Responsibility from 2019. According to the transcript, the OPR was investigating whether attorneys in the Southern District of Florida US Attorney’s Office committed professional misconduct by entering into a non-prosecution agreement with Epstein, who was being investigated by state law enforcement on sexual battery charges. Acosta was the head of the office when the agreement was signed.
Leading up to the deadline to release materials, the DOJ made three separate requests to unseal grand jury materials. Those requests were granted earlier this month.
The initial release of the Epstein files was met with protest, particularly by Epstein victims and Democratic lawmakers. “The public received a fraction of the files, and what we received was riddled with abnormal and extreme redactions with no explanation,” wrote a group of 19 women who had survived abuse from Epstein and Maxwell in a statement posted on social media. Senator Chuck Schumer said Monday that he would force a vote that would allow the Senate to sue the Trump administration for a full release of the Epstein files.
Along with the release of the new batch of files over the weekend, the Justice Department also removed at least 16 files from its initial offering, including a photograph that depicted Donald Trump. The DOJ later restored that photograph, saying in a statement on X that it had initially been flagged “for potential further action to protect victims.” The post went on to say that “after the review, it was determined there is no evidence that any Epstein victims are depicted in the photograph, and it has been reposted without any alteration or redaction.”
The Justice Department acknowledged in a fact sheet on Sunday that it has “hundreds of thousands of pages of material to release,” claiming that it has more than 200 lawyers reviewing files prior to release.
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