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The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

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Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#501

Post by wpm »

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…

In a city you’re not likely to be farther than a mile away from a high speed charger. It’s perfectly reasonable for a small city car to “fill up” occasionally to cover the short mileage they’re likely to see between charges anyways.

I don’t have an EV or a car at all, but if I did my charging regimen would be “plug it in at the fast charger at the grocery store and charge it while I shop”. It’s just not a big deal.

We certainly don’t need to make our residential streets more ugly than having a bunch of cars parked on it already does by stringing up charging infrastructure all over it.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#502

Post by brailsafe »

mynameisvlad wrote: post #355
bigcloud1299 wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guarantee that you don’t own a all Electric V. I own 2018 model S and I concur with the Op of this thread that’s the case. Charging is a huge pain in cold weather. I have insulated my garage doors and am able to keep the temp at around 45 in cold winters ( I am in Redmond).

A 240V charger, as parent commenter said, more than makes up for whatever losses are inherent in heating the car and battery. I have an uncovered space and it’s fine . Yeah, the battery sucks in the cold, and it takes longer to charge, but realistically it’s not like you need to use your car 24/7. Leaving it for a few hours overnight charges it to full, and you can schedule defrosting or do it from the app so the car…

I wouldn't buy one anyway, but first thing that comes to mind is not the convenience but the energy waste in battling the cold to keep the battery charged

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#503

Post by otabdeveloper4 »

oblio wrote: post #450
otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By 2035 people won't be driving car-shaped objects, not unless they're professional taxi drivers.

This is super ridiculous. How do you think this will happen? The buyer of the 2022 Toyota Corolla will just be banned from driving it in 2035? In the US they can't even ban guns, you expect individual driving of owned cars to be banned? :-)))

Not banned. The car shape is probably the most inefficient form factor posssible for an electric vehicle, and economic and market forces will do their thing.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#504

Post by otabdeveloper4 »

refurb wrote: post #420
otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By 2035 people won't be driving car-shaped objects, not unless they're professional taxi drivers.

People will still be driving car-shaped objected until 2055. People wildly overestimate advances. Look at how much has changed in the last 20 years. Not much.

Not as personal transportation, though. Too expensive and wasteful.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#505

Post by hefferbub »

I live in a multi-unit residential coop community, and we have managed to install a 240v outlet in each of our 90 carports, and are adding more outlets in open parking areas by mounting them on simple fence-like structures. We use 240v chargers that plug in rather than being hardwired so that we can easily move them around.

We have found that a 100 AMP service can effectively serve up to about 20 EVs, so long as the chargers can communicate among themselves to manage peaks. We use all EnelX Juicebox 40A networked chargers and they have that capability.

So how can you charge so many cars effectively with a small service? It is based on load factors.

The average commute length in the US is around 15 miles one way. So most nights for most cars they only need to replenish 30 miles worth of charge overnight. So there are plenty of hours and plenty of amps to cover that.

Of course, some folks come home from a long trip and need a full 300 mile charge, while some didn’t even drive that day and need no charge—basically it all comes out in the wash.

There are other considerations, but the takeaway is that you CAN support a lot of EVs charging for modest investments if you do it smart.

I wrote a white paper on this in case anyone is hoping to do this where you live: https://localforce.io/misc/Cost_Effective_EV_Charging_for_Mu...

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#507

Post by javajosh »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #500
javajosh wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you've got to do the experiment. Move to a major European city center, with kids, without a car, and see how you like it. I tried this in Berlin, and it was quite good! Getting around on the U-Bahn with kids is so nice . You get to hang out with your kids as you travel! Having a free, walkable Kita (daycare/school) is incredible. Being able to walk to useful things like groceries, or a coffee shop, was great. A…

Downtown and K-town are two of the very few places that are actually walkable in LA.

Yeah. But would you raise a family in DT? (Ktown already has a lot of families - and wealthy ones, too, these days).

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#508

Post by lkiernan »

ashwagary wrote: post #492
Rebelgecko wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

>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. Makes sense to charge a penalty every minute a charger is connected but not drawing power (full battery).

If you put them in convenient places then ICE cars will also park there and not be connected.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#509

Post by LinuxBender »

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…

My ICE vehicle would like a heated garage. At -10F -23C she gets upset with me. At -25F -31C she tells me where to stick the key. I work around the issue with an oil pan heater and a couple of heat lamps but I do need to build a garage and stop waiting for wood/steel prices to come back down.

As for EV's I am going to wait and see how the UPS trucks manage here. That should be some time in early 2023, hopefully before spring time.

Re: The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter

#510

Post by fomine3 »

nicoburns wrote: post #465
fomine3 wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can't "just" put for mechanical parking system.

> mechanical parking system Are those common? I know they exist, but I thought they were unusual. I've certainly never seen an actual one.

It's common here in Japan city area, since street parking is not allowed
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