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> and battery life, especially in winter, can be a life-or-death issue How so? A full battery can run your seat heaters for about a month. That's a lot bett

> and battery life, especially in winter, can be a life-or-death issue How so? A full battery can run your seat heaters for about a month. That's a lot better than the hours of heat you'd get out of a full tank of gasoline. Not to mention that you'll never get carbon monoxide poisoning from a gasoline engine with a tailpipe blocked with snow.

lazide 1y ago
Tell me you’ve never lived in a really cold climate without telling me you’ve never lived in a cold climate before.
- bryanlarsen 1y ago
  I've experienced -48. You?
  - lazide 1y ago
    -40ish for a month. And -30 around that. None of the ‘answers’ address the range issues with batteries in the cold. Or how you can be totally fucked if your pack drops below a certain temp, and you don’t have enough charge to heat the pack and get home. Probably even more fucked than if your diesel tank gelled. At least you can heat it up directly if you really need to.
    - bryanlarsen 1y ago
      You handle it the exact same way you do on a gasoline vehicle. You never let your tank go below 50%. If you slide off the road with a low tank or a low battery you can get in trouble, so don't do that. If I let my electric car sit overnight with at least 20% charge, I know it will start in the morning, even if it was -45 overnight. You can't say that with a gasoline vehicle. It'll take almost all of that 20% to get up to temperature, but once it's up it maintains it well. And anyplace cold has ubiquitous block heater plugs. At really cold temperatures it'll barely charge on a block heater plug because it'll use all the energy keeping the battery warm, but it means you start with a warm battery and a warm car, so the range drop is massively reduced.
      - lazide 1y ago
        This is incredibly delusional.
        bryanlarsen 1y ago
        No, it's lived experience.
        lazide 1y ago
        It’s delusional that you think you actually need to not go below half a tank (unlike electrical in the same situation), or that you can’t start a well maintained winterized vehicle at -48 cold (it’ll be hard on it, but it should still work) - as compared to an electric that flat out won’t work without heating the battery first. Especially gasoline powered. EV’s at these temps are very problematic and much more likely to get you actually killed if something goes wrong, because of how they work. That’s just the truth. Thinking that somehow it isn’t is the delusional part. With enough care can you potentially avoid getting into a situation where you’ll actually get in deep trouble? I guess. But the margins are way thinner, and it requires a lot of range reduction, and your worst case scenarios are much more likely to happen.
dismalaf 1y ago
Such a weird comment. Tailpipe blocked with snow? I've lived in (the cold part of) Canada nearly my whole life, never happened. Snow doesn't fall sideways and upwards to block a tailpipe lol. And range is the relevant part of a vehicle, given Canada is so large and sparsely populated, not how long seat heaters heat.
- rconti 1y ago
  It happens. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00039929.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00039929.htm https://www.rearviewsafety.com/safety/news/news-release-dead-from-carbon-monoxide-poisoning https://www.rearviewsafety.com/safety/news/news-release-dead... But it sounds like it's hard to get a handle on how common it is. It feels like it's more on the level of "a handful a year in North America/freak occurrance", rather than "common way to die".
  - bryanlarsen 1y ago
    I know of somebody it happened to. Maybe it's not particularly common, but it's in my mind as something that happens.
  - dismalaf 1y ago
    Both of those involved the cars being encased in snow, as opposed to the tailpipe specifically being blocked.
    - rconti 1y ago
      Right, but in particularly heavy snowfall, it's not hard to imagine snow encasing the chassis. Once the snow forms a barrier around the body, the exhaust has nowhere to go. Or if the pipe gets blocked (which is a bit harder to imagine, since there's heat coming out of there), and there are exhaust leaks, the exhaust is directed up through the chassis. It doesn't have to be a perfect seal to raise the CO level! I was recently stuck in a 3 hour backup in sub-freezing temps in moderate snowfall, and it was nice to be able to leave the engine running for heat. In the winter, we have a contingency where it's possible to be stuck in your vehicle overnight in heavy snowfall, and my plan was always to wake up every couple of hours to ensure the snow was clear of the car. https://www.nbcbayarea.com/local/3-young-women-found-dead-in-car-near-squaw-valley/1847828/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/local/3-young-women-found-dead-in...
ledauphin 1y ago
I mean... a thought experiment like "medical emergency in remote location" would seem a useful place to start.
- Dylan16807 1y ago
  I'm thinking about it. Is it road-accessible? What kinds of vehicles can get there? The cars in the article have twice as much range as a gas car or more, even in the cold. And it's easier to charge them at remote locations than to get fuel deliveries to those same remote locations. I'm sure a scenario could be contrived where any type of car wins, but on average I expect a long range battery car to do quite well.
Zee2 1y ago
I believe they are talking about how the range/capacity is significantly affected in deep cold weather. It's not about life-or-death that you'll freeze to death - it's that your 300mi EV turns into a 150mi EV and that makes range planning unpredictable and more challenging in rural areas.
- 8note 1y ago
  if your car battery is dead because it was -30C all night, your gas car isn't starting either
  - slaw 1y ago
    Gasoline/petrol cars start after -30C all night without any issues.
  - AngryData 1y ago
    -30 isnt really even challenging for a gasoline car, you would need -60 or more for gasoline to become thick enough to be a concern. More likely at that temperature is your battery being unable to turn your engine over to try and start it and might require a jump to get turning over. Diesels may struggle at that temperature, buts its a known issue that northerners add anti-gelling additives and/or block heaters for. Of course an EV can and should have built in battery heaters for that too.

lazide 1y ago

Tell me you’ve never lived in a really cold climate without telling me you’ve never lived in a cold climate before.

bryanlarsen 1y ago
I've experienced -48. You?
- lazide 1y ago
  -40ish for a month. And -30 around that. None of the ‘answers’ address the range issues with batteries in the cold. Or how you can be totally fucked if your pack drops below a certain temp, and you don’t have enough charge to heat the pack and get home. Probably even more fucked than if your diesel tank gelled. At least you can heat it up directly if you really need to.
  - bryanlarsen 1y ago
    You handle it the exact same way you do on a gasoline vehicle. You never let your tank go below 50%. If you slide off the road with a low tank or a low battery you can get in trouble, so don't do that. If I let my electric car sit overnight with at least 20% charge, I know it will start in the morning, even if it was -45 overnight. You can't say that with a gasoline vehicle. It'll take almost all of that 20% to get up to temperature, but once it's up it maintains it well. And anyplace cold has ubiquitous block heater plugs. At really cold temperatures it'll barely charge on a block heater plug because it'll use all the energy keeping the battery warm, but it means you start with a warm battery and a warm car, so the range drop is massively reduced.
    - lazide 1y ago
      This is incredibly delusional.
      - bryanlarsen 1y ago
        No, it's lived experience.
        lazide 1y ago
        It’s delusional that you think you actually need to not go below half a tank (unlike electrical in the same situation), or that you can’t start a well maintained winterized vehicle at -48 cold (it’ll be hard on it, but it should still work) - as compared to an electric that flat out won’t work without heating the battery first. Especially gasoline powered. EV’s at these temps are very problematic and much more likely to get you actually killed if something goes wrong, because of how they work. That’s just the truth. Thinking that somehow it isn’t is the delusional part. With enough care can you potentially avoid getting into a situation where you’ll actually get in deep trouble? I guess. But the margins are way thinner, and it requires a lot of range reduction, and your worst case scenarios are much more likely to happen.

dismalaf 1y ago

Such a weird comment. Tailpipe blocked with snow? I've lived in (the cold part of) Canada nearly my whole life, never happened. Snow doesn't fall sideways and upwards to block a tailpipe lol. And range is the relevant part of a vehicle, given Canada is so large and sparsely populated, not how long seat heaters heat.

rconti 1y ago
It happens. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00039929.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00039929.htm https://www.rearviewsafety.com/safety/news/news-release-dead-from-carbon-monoxide-poisoning https://www.rearviewsafety.com/safety/news/news-release-dead... But it sounds like it's hard to get a handle on how common it is. It feels like it's more on the level of "a handful a year in North America/freak occurrance", rather than "common way to die".
- bryanlarsen 1y ago
  I know of somebody it happened to. Maybe it's not particularly common, but it's in my mind as something that happens.
- dismalaf 1y ago
  Both of those involved the cars being encased in snow, as opposed to the tailpipe specifically being blocked.
  - rconti 1y ago
    Right, but in particularly heavy snowfall, it's not hard to imagine snow encasing the chassis. Once the snow forms a barrier around the body, the exhaust has nowhere to go. Or if the pipe gets blocked (which is a bit harder to imagine, since there's heat coming out of there), and there are exhaust leaks, the exhaust is directed up through the chassis. It doesn't have to be a perfect seal to raise the CO level! I was recently stuck in a 3 hour backup in sub-freezing temps in moderate snowfall, and it was nice to be able to leave the engine running for heat. In the winter, we have a contingency where it's possible to be stuck in your vehicle overnight in heavy snowfall, and my plan was always to wake up every couple of hours to ensure the snow was clear of the car. https://www.nbcbayarea.com/local/3-young-women-found-dead-in-car-near-squaw-valley/1847828/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/local/3-young-women-found-dead-in...

ledauphin 1y ago

I mean... a thought experiment like "medical emergency in remote location" would seem a useful place to start.

Dylan16807 1y ago
I'm thinking about it. Is it road-accessible? What kinds of vehicles can get there? The cars in the article have twice as much range as a gas car or more, even in the cold. And it's easier to charge them at remote locations than to get fuel deliveries to those same remote locations. I'm sure a scenario could be contrived where any type of car wins, but on average I expect a long range battery car to do quite well.

Zee2 1y ago

I believe they are talking about how the range/capacity is significantly affected in deep cold weather. It's not about life-or-death that you'll freeze to death - it's that your 300mi EV turns into a 150mi EV and that makes range planning unpredictable and more challenging in rural areas.

8note 1y ago
if your car battery is dead because it was -30C all night, your gas car isn't starting either
- slaw 1y ago
  Gasoline/petrol cars start after -30C all night without any issues.
- AngryData 1y ago
  -30 isnt really even challenging for a gasoline car, you would need -60 or more for gasoline to become thick enough to be a concern. More likely at that temperature is your battery being unable to turn your engine over to try and start it and might require a jump to get turning over. Diesels may struggle at that temperature, buts its a known issue that northerners add anti-gelling additives and/or block heaters for. Of course an EV can and should have built in battery heaters for that too.