Delhi cut grid losses from 50% to 5%, as electrification pushes energy demand down

Delhi has cut its electricity losses from about 50 percent to 5 percent, IEEE Spectrum reported on 29 September. The story is a first-person account by an engineer who moved to the city in 2002, when blackouts hit her kitchen three times in a week. It is the newest dated item in this dossier and it is also the most useful one, because it reframes a debate that is usually fought over generation and cables: the cheapest grid investment is the power you stop losing.

At the same time, a 29 September analysis by Hannah Ritchie, working from Oxford professor Nick Eyre's numbers, argues that electrification cuts final energy demand by roughly 40 percent. Total demand falls from 416 exajoules today to 247 EJ post-transition, while electricity's own share rises from 110 EJ to 189 EJ. Electricity supplies one quarter of final energy today and would supply three quarters afterwards, with hydrogen covering much of the rest. Cars and vans would need about a quarter of today's energy, because a petrol car converts roughly 20 percent of its fuel into motion against 80 percent for an electric one.

Put those two findings side by side and the investment question changes shape. Less energy is needed. Fewer units are lost. The capital still has to move, though, and the dossier shows where the pressure sits.

Transport & Environment, summarised by CleanTechnica on 28 September, found that in six of nine major EU truck markets electric trucks are already the cheapest financial choice over a five-year horizon. Those six markets account for 46 percent of new heavy truck sales in the EU. Five-year savings reach €100,000 in the Netherlands, €85,000 in Germany and €69,000 in Denmark, with payback in two years; a Chinese truck pushes Dutch savings to €128,000. T&E says its modelling shows e-trucks becoming cheaper in all nine member states by 2030 even if purchase subsidies are phased out.

That argument depends on policy holding. CleanTechnica reported on 28 September that T&E wants the EU's -43 percent 2030 truck CO2 target kept, CO2-based tolling under the Eurovignette Directive, and RED III e-credits for depot charging in Sweden, France, Poland, Italy and Spain.

Supply is moving too. Volkswagen said on 29 September that the ID. Tiguan will go on sale in early 2027, succeeding the ID.4 and ID.5, with a world premiere in early October. The company says the Tiguan and Tayron together passed one million deliveries last year, and that the ID.4 and ID.5 have passed 950,000 units since 2021. Elsewhere, Electrek reported on 29 September that the USPTO granted Tesla patent US 12,746,987 B1 for four ducted fans in a rear diffuser, filed in January 2024 and traced to a provisional from 17 January 2023. The drawings show a Model S, which Tesla stopped building in April.

Charging infrastructure remains the weaker link. In an op-ed published by CleanTechnica on 29 September, the Philippine EV roadmap's target of 7,300 charging stations by 2028 is described as the most fragile part of the plan, against a 2028 goal of 311,700 registered EVs and a 50 percent fleet electrification target for 2040.

Not every grid story is about vehicles. Endpoints News reported on 29 September that SK pharmteco will spend at least $200 million over five years on development and manufacturing capacity. And The Hacker News reported on 29 September that Dutch police arrested a 24-year-old Amsterdam man in the ShinyHunters investigation, with a Rotterdam District Court appearance listed for 29 September; the group denied any link to him.