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Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

nytimes.com

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Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#101

Post by PH95VuimJjqBqy »

xyst wrote: post #48
tw04 wrote: post #6

90% of the complaints appear to be from folks who have no ability to charge at home. I would agree with the sentiment that if you have to drive any significant distance daily, and live in an apartment where you can’t charge at home, having an EV is going to be a giant pain and it might be a little too soon to go that route. I’d imagine we’re still several years away from having robust enough charging infrastructure a…

The real blunder in this country is the lack of viable alternative transportation options in a majority of the nation. Visited NYC recently and didn’t need to rent a car. Primarily took the bus, ferry, and rail car/trains. In some cases I just walked from my hotel to the destination. Could have rented one of the e-bikes as well. Transportation costs for just 1 week were less than $100 (a quarter of this was because o…

quick, someone tell that small rural community of 600 people they need public transportation!

When people express opinions like this you immediately know they live in the city and think everyone else does too.

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#102

Post by samstave »

itishappy wrote: post #75
samstave wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish charging stations were a bus along the row of spaces with arms that rise up from the center of a parking spot to couple with the charging port of a car on the underside. Then, if its not a EV - the arm just stays down and the spot is just a flat regular spot. If that makes sense.

As nice as that sounds, I don't think using expensive and high demand charging slots as dumb storage spaces makes much sense at the moment. At least until they're a lot more common.

It would make sense for certain areas of parking garages. Especially in car-smart places like singapore.

(I have a bias on singapore, because the car market/culture there is, in my experience, rather unique. Singaporians, in my experiences (which is a decade ago) - really treat their cars/car infra with a lot more care than the US due to how expensive it is to get a car there (for good reason)...

They 80%+ of the time back into their spots, their roads are clean and I dont recall seeing a dirty car in Singapore... They integrate green parking lots (vegetation growing through the X cobbles, plants on the sides of over passes - they SEEM to have a healthier relationship with the car than most)

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#103

Post by bryanlarsen »

NDizzle wrote: post #97
thebruce87m wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ICE cars have to go to a gas station every ~500 miles. For some EV owners like me, the trade off in time saved refuelling an ICE car is spent on charging on rare long journeys. I actually save time overall. But each use-case is different.

On long journeys I stop every 300-350 miles. Bladders can't make it longer than that, although the cars certainly can. I wouldn't stop at all on a 275 mile trip. I would fill up before I return, however.

Even in the winter? I've been stuck for hours in a vehicle in the winter; an empty fuel tank can't provide the heat that will keep you alive in that situation.

P.S. Most gasoline vehicles in my experience don't have 500 mile range, either. My Mazda 5 has a 375 mile range.

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#104

Post by cjrp »

johndunne wrote: post #91
billy99k wrote: post #45

We should have pushed for hybrid cars. This way, we can build the infrastructure along-side our current gas stations and give people an incentive to buy them (increases range of gas powered cars). It would have been a win-win all around. Instead, governments want to force us to all electric too early with nowhere near the proper infrastructure.

Completely agree. I’m looking for a new car and I’ve dry runned some long road trips I commonly do between Yorkshire and Dublin, and in a pure ev car, it’s a very different prospect to petrol only. Plus, hybrid has lots of regenerative energy recovery that can be done to extend the mpg on the same fuel.

How so? Using Whitby as an example, it's about 240 miles (4h40) to Holyhead; you could stop on the way for a little top-up and loo break. If you wanted to arrive in Dublin with a fullish battery, there's a Gridserve at the port itself, or it looks like you can even charge onboard the ferry. https://www.irishferries.com/ie-en/frequently-asked-question...

I'm sure those chargers are all relatively expensive per kWh though, so yes compared to a petrol/diesel it would be a more expensive journey.

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#105

Post by kjellsbells »

tw04 wrote: post #76
natch wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or an electrical outlet within reach. “Charging station” makes it sound inordinately expensive. An outlet is all they need and is already hard enough that there’s no need to make it sound harder than it is.

That's not exactly accurate. Pick a car - say a Mustang Mach-e: a standard 15A outlet is going to charge at 4miles/hr. Say you get home a 6pm, never go anywhere, and leave it plugged in overnight - that's 48 miles of range. If you're talking dead of winter in Chicago in negative temps, assume half that. Long story short: a 15A outlet really isn't going to get the job done for charging a car. Also you cannot just char…

There's also a little psychology at play. On an ICE car, a full tank shows up as 300+ miles of range, and 48 miles of range would be a strong prompt to most driver to get to a gas station, even if they only needed to drive another 15 miles. People dont like thinking they could be caught short.

People also like to think that their car can get them out of any personal jam, eg, if they need to take a family membership to the hospital, they will simply assume that their car is going to be the mode of transporter, and anything that makes them think that an EV might not be able to cut it in that hypothetical is going to be damaging for the EV transition.

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#106

Post by PH95VuimJjqBqy »

epistasis wrote: post #41
jdpedrie wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The differences are a) you don't lose notable range in cold weather (and your car continues to reliably tell you your remaining range), and b) there's always another gas station a block down.

Yes, you do lose notable range in a gas car in cold weather: https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/coldweather.shtml It's really interesting what sort of things are considered problems with EVs that just get ignored with gas cars. The dual standard is pretty interesting to observe.

> Fuel economy tests show that, in city driving, a conventional gasoline car's gas mileage is roughly 15% lower at 20°F than it would be at 77°F. It can drop as much as 24% for short (3- to 4-mile) trips.

> The effect on hybrids is typically greater. Their fuel economy can drop about 30% to 34% under these conditions.

> For electric vehicles (EVs), fuel economy can drop roughly 39% in mixed city and highway driving, and range can drop by 41%. About two-thirds of the extra energy consumed is used to heat the cabin.

Gee, I wonder why people are more concerned about EV's. Could it be that they lose upwards of 40% range whereas ICE loses roughly 15% fuel economy?

And don't tell me I'm being unfair, ICE can lose up to 25% for 3-4 mile trips, which is not the use case anyone is worrying about.

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#107

Post by joezydeco »

_ea1k wrote: post #86
mikestew wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to assume you either don’t drive much, or don’t actually own an electric car. Those are the only explanations I have for making such an inaccurate (I hesitate to quote the word “ignorant“) statement. — Owner of an EV that would take days to charge on 120V

I used an EV for years with a 120V. It also would "take days to charge", but 12 hours would net ~24%. It is surprisingly usable, especially if there is a nearby DCFC bottom charge at if you ever get a little low. Of course, there are caveats. If it is cold and the vehicle has to be charged at the street, charge times will be much longer. But he's right that people often underestimate the usefulness of L1 charging, ev…

If the vehicle is cold soaked and only has a minimal amount of charge left, won't most of it be consumed by the EV trying to preheat the battery?

Seems like you're then trapped in a corner case that you can't get out of: not enough energy to allow for any kind of charge at all.

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#108

Post by antisthenes »

billy99k wrote: post #45

We should have pushed for hybrid cars. This way, we can build the infrastructure along-side our current gas stations and give people an incentive to buy them (increases range of gas powered cars). It would have been a win-win all around. Instead, governments want to force us to all electric too early with nowhere near the proper infrastructure.

> We should have pushed for hybrid cars.

Who's this "we"? Toyota has already sold millions of hybrid vehicles to willing customers all over the world, probably more than all electric vehicles combined.

Also, government can't force anything, if people don't have the money and the home charging needed for an EV, then they won't get it, short of govt giving them a free car.

Re: Electric Car Owners Confront a Harsh Foe: Cold Weather

#110

Post by bryanlarsen »

PH95VuimJjqBqy wrote: post #101
xyst wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real blunder in this country is the lack of viable alternative transportation options in a majority of the nation. Visited NYC recently and didn’t need to rent a car. Primarily took the bus, ferry, and rail car/trains. In some cases I just walked from my hotel to the destination. Could have rented one of the e-bikes as well. Transportation costs for just 1 week were less than $100 (a quarter of this was because o…

quick, someone tell that small rural community of 600 people they need public transportation! When people express opinions like this you immediately know they live in the city and think everyone else does too.

In my experience in Canada, small rural communities typically do have public transportation. Small rural communities generally have a lot of elderly people, so most small towns provide a wheelchair accessible taxi-like service.
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