Professor Examines Human Behavior and Electric Vehicle Charging

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This article originally appeared in the fall 2024 issue of UC San Diego Magazine as a sidebar titled “Are You Ready to Make the Swap?” that ran alongside “The Battery (EV)olution.”

The potential of a widespread, zero-emission electric vehicle fleet relies in part on whether human behavior can be adjusted when it comes to fueling practices. “With an EV, you’re competing against the gasoline car and the gasoline car experience, which is generally a positive, known routine for the driver — you drive to the gas station, you fill it up, and three minutes later you’re on your way,” says David Victor, a professor and the Peter Cowhey Center on Global Transformation Chair in Innovation and Public Policy at the School of Global Policy and Strategy and the director of the Deep Decarbonization Initiative. 

As part of an ongoing study of human behavior, approximately 900 UC San Diego drivers volunteered to participate in randomized experiments with control groups to see how different kinds of information and incentives convince people to charge at different times of day. “The goal is for cars to be charged at peak renewable energy generation,” says Victor. Doing so saves money because instead of needing to build additional (and costly) extra storage systems to keep the energy available for overnight charging, the EVs act as the primary storage. 

“This is an area where we are using the university network to advance fundamental scientific research on human behavior and the intersection of economics and psychology,” says Victor. The School of Global Policy and Strategy and the Jacobs School of Engineering are the anchors for the study, which is connected to UC San Diego’s Deep Decarbonization Initiative and the Center for Energy Research.  

“The EV revolution will hinge on human behavior,” Victor says. “And the world doesn’t know very much about what’s actually going to affect that behavior.”