Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

axios.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

321–330 of 549 posts

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#321

Post by StanislavPetrov »

GalenErso wrote: post #32
brianglick wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You wouldn't really need a heated garage (at home, anyway) if you had a 220 volt charger. That should be able to overcome any charging challenges in extreme cold, anyway. Relatively easy to get that into your garage. Also - if you arrive at your friend's place in the winter and park overnight, you won't lose a ton overnight if the car's just parked there.

Meanwhile, with an ICE car, you don't need to worry about having a garage, nevermind a heated one; the right charger, warming a pack, losing fuel overnight, or taking three hours to fully charge. I can pull up to any gas station and fill my tank in 2 minutes. And my gas isn't magically evaporating if it's a little chilly. The 30 different requirements for EVs to work in cold weather are too complex and prohibitively…

[flagged]

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#322

Post by defrost »

xyzelement wrote: post #316
Beltalowda wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Science evolves as does technology, and inevitably both factors will change over the coming decades. To base your life around the worst case predictions of models (where the disaster moment keeps pushing back as time progresses) is not logical. Operating on the basis of the most extremist "worst case" scenarios that are very unlikely (like your "peak oil" example) probably doesn't make too much sense, but it's prob…

I am in favor of a risk-based approach as you're describing. Some certain sacrifice today is worth some unclear reduction in an uncertain future event. The question is - how much? If you wanted to be extreme in CO2 reduction, I guess your best bet is to kill every living human and animal on the planet (to be clear, not advocating this!) Clearly that's "too high" a price to pay. On the other hand, you can be very prac…

> Increasing vehicle mileage is an example of this - mileage has doubled and emissions per vehicles halved since 1975.

A fantastic point!

Unfortuneately undercut by absolute truth (rather than per vehicle comparisons) that

* the number of vehicles (both in the US and globally) has substantially increased in number since the 1970s,

* many of the older vehicles with the poor performance are still active on roads somewhere,

* the nature of vehicle use in western countries has changed - while the efficiences for both cars and SUVs may have improved, the proprtion of SUV usage (with lesser efficiencies) has significantly increased.

I wouldn't advocate killing all humans and animals, but there's much to be said for halving the number of high consumption humans ...

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#323

Post by StanislavPetrov »

josephcsible wrote: post #224
devb wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> not having a 220v outlet in the garage will be like not having a microwave What about the millions of people who live in apartments and rowhouses?

Where do those people park their cars now? Wherever that is, put a charger on a post next to the spot.

And where does the electricity come for those chargers? Huge swaths of the USA are experiencing rolling blackouts right now because there isn't enough electrical capacity.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#324

Post by StanislavPetrov »

EdwardDiego wrote: post #232
isityouyesitsme wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, 10 years behind EV. It makes sense that it is where it is. Please point out anywhere where anyone says the accomplishments are not remarkable on their own, if you are not comparing them to the thing with 100 years infra behind it. Now compare that to the seemingly endless number of evangelists who think that 10 years from now is a good time to impose a mandate to kill all new ICE vehicle manufacturing, in spite o…

Where does Person B live? In a hut in Siberia?

Half of the United States feels like a hut in Siberia right now due to freezing temperatures and the lack of electrical capacity.

https://www.fox29.com/news/pennsylvania-warned-of-rolling-bl...

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#325

Post by Rebelgecko »

pmontra wrote: post #225
cwalv wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But you know what I don't do? Freeze my ass off standing in a gas station in subzero temperatures and howling winds! Not missing that at all. Right! And I suspect by 2035, not having a 220v outlet in the garage will be like not having a microwave in your kitchen in the mid 90's.

Not everybody has a garage. Cities are full of parked cars in front of residential buildings. It did park my car in a street when I was living in a city. By 2035 those streets must be refitted with chargers, one per parking slot and somehow replace the energy distributed as gasoline and diesel with electrical energy. If that doesn't happen people will have to leave their car at a charging station for far more time th…

I don't totally agree with the magnitude of how much more work needs to be done- we don't have one gas pump per ICE car, and electric cars don't need to be charged every day.

It's fair to say that people hogging chargers even when they're done charging is a problem, there's a public charger on my street that is near 100% utilization. However this seems pretty solvable- companies can just charge per minute as long as the spot is occupied and let the free market sort it out.

Adding public chargers is also a great way for places like malls, grocery stores, offices, etc to stay relevant, since my weekly shopping trips would probably be enough to keep a car topped off

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#326

Post by xyzelement »

defrost wrote: post #322
xyzelement wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am in favor of a risk-based approach as you're describing. Some certain sacrifice today is worth some unclear reduction in an uncertain future event. The question is - how much? If you wanted to be extreme in CO2 reduction, I guess your best bet is to kill every living human and animal on the planet (to be clear, not advocating this!) Clearly that's "too high" a price to pay. On the other hand, you can be very prac…

> Increasing vehicle mileage is an example of this - mileage has doubled and emissions per vehicles halved since 1975. A fantastic point! Unfortuneately undercut by absolute truth (rather than per vehicle comparisons) that * the number of vehicles (both in the US and globally) has substantially increased in number since the 1970s, * many of the older vehicles with the poor performance are still active on roads somewh…

Careful because inevitably someone would classify you as "high consumption" and try to halve you.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#327

Post by fwungy »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #203
Enginerrrd wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the biggest thing EV proponents seem to miss is that you don't need to force it to be 100% for everyone. Confine any mandates to urban centers where it makes sense, you can get buy in from everyone and solve 95% of the problem. At that point there will be lower hanging fruits than the last 5% or w/e.

You think it's the pro ponents that miss that it doesn't need to be 100%? The arguments I see that act like it has to be 100% EVs are basically all anti -EV arguments.

States are mandating no ICE sales by 2035. That is why people are becoming anti-EV. No one would care about EV policy if it wasnt being forced on an insane schedule.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#328

Post by jancsika »

xyst wrote: post #207

Yet another reason why EVs won’t save us from the inefficiencies of car centric transportation. Americans, can we stop this failed experiment and let’s (re)build our cities with public transportation and alternative forms of transportation (ie, biking, walking, micro-mobility). Return the spaces occupied by parking lots, parking garages and use that space to house people. End these implied subsidies on “car housing”.…

That, or roll out fiber nationwide and just have everyone do their business inside Fortnite all day in their parents' basements.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#329

Post by twarge »

StanislavPetrov wrote: post #323
josephcsible wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do those people park their cars now? Wherever that is, put a charger on a post next to the spot.

And where does the electricity come for those chargers? Huge swaths of the USA are experiencing rolling blackouts right now because there isn't enough electrical capacity.

And the car batteries can supply peak demand instead of having a blackout.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#330

Post by sixQuarks »

d_watt wrote: post #19

Anecdotally last winter, had a Model Y up in maine for a trip home. I arrived at a backwoods house with ~60 miles left. It was around 10 farenheit the next day when I hooked up a 110 volt line to the car. Over the next 30 minutes the mileage dropped to 55 as it took more energy to heat the battery than the line could deliver. I unhooked it and planned to drive 20 miles to the nearest charger, but after 1 mile of trav…

I bet if you had just left it plugged in, it would’ve started charging after the battery warmed up. You freaked out because in cold weather the battery won’t start charging right away, energy will be used to heat up the battery first.
Post reply on HN