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For what it's worth, this is slowly changing. BattleBorn has certified their LifePo4 batteries to lower temperatures. Been a while since I watched this. [1]

For what it's worth, this is slowly changing. BattleBorn has certified their LifePo4 batteries to lower temperatures. Been a while since I watched this. [1] Just slower charge rates, but no longer unsafe due to charge controller changes. Previous versions would shut off the charge below 0C. So charging slowly over night may still be useful, but speed charging in cold weather would not. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywn-vBjKblI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywn-vBjKblI

unixhero 6y ago
-20C is not enough
- LinuxBender 6y ago
  Yeah, they are compensating with heating elements. This will of course use some of the capacity. Telsa is doing heating elements as well. Heating during overnight charging should be easier if you are on grid power. Charging batteries when they are cold can harm them. Discharging them when they are cold equates to more internal resistance, so you could lose up to 15% range without heating elements. No idea how much power the heating elements draw. I would bet that Tesla's battery acquisition Maxwell [1] could make some improvements in this area. [1] - https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/04/teslas-maxwell-acquisition-aims-to-gives-its-batteries-a-boost/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/04/teslas-maxwell-acquisition...
  - Robotbeat 6y ago
    It’s not as if internal combustion engines work great in -20C temperatures either. Often they won’t even start, and diesels typically have an (plug-in electric!) engine block heater in such climates. So I just don’t see this as a problem. Also, what proportion of the world lives in climates where it makes sense to optimize for -20C weather? Northern Europe, parts of North America... and that’s pretty much it. So while Norway (which now buys mostly electric cars... and famously a LOT of Teslas) might use cold-optimized chemistries, it’s not a major consideration for electrifying the world.
    - nitrogen 6y ago
      Also, what proportion of the world lives in climates where it makes sense to optimize for -20C weather? Dismissing problems or desires that don't affect people you know is pretty shortsighted. Also, skiing.
      - Robotbeat 6y ago
        It’s dissmissible if the comparable solution (internal combustion engines) already have to use the exact same intervention (engine block heater). I grew up in Minnesota (and visit regularly). If anything it affects me MORE than most people, and I’ve been stranded with a non-starting internal combustion engine car in the cold winter many times which is how I know the existing internal combustion engines already don’t do well. It is not uncommon for parking lots (especially in the Northern parts) to be equipped with outlets for this precise reason (and people often leave their engines running while they go into the store on particularly cold nights so they won’t be stranded). Makes electrification there actually easier in some ways as there’s already widespread infrastructure for trickle charging. Concerns which are not that well-informed are, indeed, dismissible.
      - dogma1138 6y ago
        If you drive an ICE car bought in say California to where it gets to -20c and park it outside it won’t start either since most likely the dealership didn’t include a block heater in your package.
        drcoopster 6y ago
        Sure, maybe if the car is 40 years old. But every modern gas car (and all the diesels I've owned) will handle it just fine.
        emkoemko 6y ago
        not true, i don't see anyone on my street plugging in and we get -30 or lower some days, though probably not good for the engine but yes they will start no problem.
    - 6y ago
- Robotbeat 6y ago
  Diesels need plug-in electric engine block heaters at anything like those temperatures as well. This would be the same thing.
  - YarickR2 6y ago
    No they do not. They need winterized diesel fuel (kerosene added), but that's it. -30C was a "nothing special" for BMW N47 engine to start. -37C is a pour point of 0w40 engine oil, but higher temps are fine in terms of cold engine startups
- thatfrenchguy 6y ago
  Not a lot of people live in climates where it goes under -20C. Folks in Eastern Canada seem to be doing fine with 250 mile EVs as well.
  - cmrdporcupine 6y ago
    What are you talking about? It gets under -20C routinely each winter for a couple nights every year through the whole of the northeast; upstate New York, Vermont, Maine, New Hampshire, Ontario, Quebec. Toronto is the 3rd/4th most populous city in North America (depending on how you count it). Almost every winter there's a -25C overnight. Not for days on end like where I grew up in Alberta, and not every year, but it definitely happens. There's 7 million people in the Greater Toronto / Hamilton corridor alone. 2 million people in the Montreal area. Almost a million in Quebec City, 1.4 millionish people in the Ottawa/Gatineau area. Not to mention Detroit, Windsor, Buffalo, Albany, Syracuse, Burlington, etc. etc. etc. Oh, and I'm seeing a mean minimum of -19C in Chicago for January, too, so throw in a few more million people there because that's close enough. "Not a lot indeed." Only maybe a couple dozen million people. EDIT: Oh yeah, I hear the US has a "midwest", too. I hear there's people there, too.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- fshbbdssbbgdd 6y ago
  Here’s a map of the minimum yearly temperatures in the US: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/73h7eo/winter_low_temperature_map_of_the_usa_10800x7200/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/73h7eo/winter_low_... (note C vs F on the legend) As someone who lives in California, and likes snow sports, it looks like I could run into -20C conditions in the Sierras, and certainly the Rockies (although driving that far with an electric car would probably be too annoying to attempt). It’s probably not a concern for the average Bay Area family.
  - zeckalpha 6y ago
    Two weeks ago I had -32C in MN and it didn’t set any records.
    - dmoy 6y ago
      Also my family back there told me it didn't get above -20C for like a week or two in a row.
  - jcranmer 6y ago
    I use a rough metric of 0°F as the lowest low to generally worry about (Fahrenheit is nice that the 0-100°F range is pretty close to the typical ambient temperature range in temperate zones). Despite living around the 5b/6a zone boundary (that's -10°F on the map), I have yet to see my car's temperature gauge report 0°F or below, so the conditions are a bit lower than I'd gauge as "lowest typical low." But that said, zones 6a/6b are definitely in the region of "yeah, I'd worry about 0°F overnight", and people in 7a will definitely worry about temperatures around 10°F if they're going to start their car. 6a-7a covers most of the population corridor in the NE US, about ⅓ the US population. Additionally, much of the Midwest is in the 0°F-is-possible territory, from St. Louis and Chicago straight through to Detroit and Pittsburgh. The general point is that starting in -20°C isn't some "well, sucks to live in Canada/Minnesota/North Dakota" concern, but rather "gee, a significant chunk of the US population has to do this on an annual basis."

unixhero 6y ago

-20C is not enough

LinuxBender 6y ago
Yeah, they are compensating with heating elements. This will of course use some of the capacity. Telsa is doing heating elements as well. Heating during overnight charging should be easier if you are on grid power. Charging batteries when they are cold can harm them. Discharging them when they are cold equates to more internal resistance, so you could lose up to 15% range without heating elements. No idea how much power the heating elements draw. I would bet that Tesla's battery acquisition Maxwell [1] could make some improvements in this area. [1] - https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/04/teslas-maxwell-acquisition-aims-to-gives-its-batteries-a-boost/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/04/teslas-maxwell-acquisition...
- Robotbeat 6y ago
  It’s not as if internal combustion engines work great in -20C temperatures either. Often they won’t even start, and diesels typically have an (plug-in electric!) engine block heater in such climates. So I just don’t see this as a problem. Also, what proportion of the world lives in climates where it makes sense to optimize for -20C weather? Northern Europe, parts of North America... and that’s pretty much it. So while Norway (which now buys mostly electric cars... and famously a LOT of Teslas) might use cold-optimized chemistries, it’s not a major consideration for electrifying the world.
  - nitrogen 6y ago
    Also, what proportion of the world lives in climates where it makes sense to optimize for -20C weather? Dismissing problems or desires that don't affect people you know is pretty shortsighted. Also, skiing.
    - Robotbeat 6y ago
      It’s dissmissible if the comparable solution (internal combustion engines) already have to use the exact same intervention (engine block heater). I grew up in Minnesota (and visit regularly). If anything it affects me MORE than most people, and I’ve been stranded with a non-starting internal combustion engine car in the cold winter many times which is how I know the existing internal combustion engines already don’t do well. It is not uncommon for parking lots (especially in the Northern parts) to be equipped with outlets for this precise reason (and people often leave their engines running while they go into the store on particularly cold nights so they won’t be stranded). Makes electrification there actually easier in some ways as there’s already widespread infrastructure for trickle charging. Concerns which are not that well-informed are, indeed, dismissible.
    - dogma1138 6y ago
      If you drive an ICE car bought in say California to where it gets to -20c and park it outside it won’t start either since most likely the dealership didn’t include a block heater in your package.
      - drcoopster 6y ago
        Sure, maybe if the car is 40 years old. But every modern gas car (and all the diesels I've owned) will handle it just fine.
      - emkoemko 6y ago
        not true, i don't see anyone on my street plugging in and we get -30 or lower some days, though probably not good for the engine but yes they will start no problem.
  - 6y ago
Robotbeat 6y ago
Diesels need plug-in electric engine block heaters at anything like those temperatures as well. This would be the same thing.
- YarickR2 6y ago
  No they do not. They need winterized diesel fuel (kerosene added), but that's it. -30C was a "nothing special" for BMW N47 engine to start. -37C is a pour point of 0w40 engine oil, but higher temps are fine in terms of cold engine startups
thatfrenchguy 6y ago
Not a lot of people live in climates where it goes under -20C. Folks in Eastern Canada seem to be doing fine with 250 mile EVs as well.
- cmrdporcupine 6y ago
  What are you talking about? It gets under -20C routinely each winter for a couple nights every year through the whole of the northeast; upstate New York, Vermont, Maine, New Hampshire, Ontario, Quebec. Toronto is the 3rd/4th most populous city in North America (depending on how you count it). Almost every winter there's a -25C overnight. Not for days on end like where I grew up in Alberta, and not every year, but it definitely happens. There's 7 million people in the Greater Toronto / Hamilton corridor alone. 2 million people in the Montreal area. Almost a million in Quebec City, 1.4 millionish people in the Ottawa/Gatineau area. Not to mention Detroit, Windsor, Buffalo, Albany, Syracuse, Burlington, etc. etc. etc. Oh, and I'm seeing a mean minimum of -19C in Chicago for January, too, so throw in a few more million people there because that's close enough. "Not a lot indeed." Only maybe a couple dozen million people. EDIT: Oh yeah, I hear the US has a "midwest", too. I hear there's people there, too.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
fshbbdssbbgdd 6y ago
Here’s a map of the minimum yearly temperatures in the US: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/73h7eo/winter_low_temperature_map_of_the_usa_10800x7200/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/73h7eo/winter_low_... (note C vs F on the legend) As someone who lives in California, and likes snow sports, it looks like I could run into -20C conditions in the Sierras, and certainly the Rockies (although driving that far with an electric car would probably be too annoying to attempt). It’s probably not a concern for the average Bay Area family.
- zeckalpha 6y ago
  Two weeks ago I had -32C in MN and it didn’t set any records.
  - dmoy 6y ago
    Also my family back there told me it didn't get above -20C for like a week or two in a row.
- jcranmer 6y ago
  I use a rough metric of 0°F as the lowest low to generally worry about (Fahrenheit is nice that the 0-100°F range is pretty close to the typical ambient temperature range in temperate zones). Despite living around the 5b/6a zone boundary (that's -10°F on the map), I have yet to see my car's temperature gauge report 0°F or below, so the conditions are a bit lower than I'd gauge as "lowest typical low." But that said, zones 6a/6b are definitely in the region of "yeah, I'd worry about 0°F overnight", and people in 7a will definitely worry about temperatures around 10°F if they're going to start their car. 6a-7a covers most of the population corridor in the NE US, about ⅓ the US population. Additionally, much of the Midwest is in the 0°F-is-possible territory, from St. Louis and Chicago straight through to Detroit and Pittsburgh. The general point is that starting in -20°C isn't some "well, sucks to live in Canada/Minnesota/North Dakota" concern, but rather "gee, a significant chunk of the US population has to do this on an annual basis."