Perhaps due to more stop/start driving and slower (less 70mph cruising). Might use more gas during warm up. Use more gas by starting the car, letting it warm up the insides, then driving, as some people do, because they want the heater to work when they’re driving.
I have not done any personal research for 40+ years, though.
Done
Looks like as long as you do not heat the cabin with the engine plug-in EV perform BETTER than other types of vehicles in cold weather
Cold weather effects can vary by vehicle model. However, expect conventional gasoline vehicles to suffer a 10% to 20% fuel economy loss in city driving and a 15% to 33% loss on short trips.
For hybrids, fuel economy typically decreases by 20% to 40% in city driving and 25% to 45% on short trips.
When the cabin heater is not used, EV fuel economy is 8% lower at 20°F than at 75°F. Driving range is about 12% lower.
Glad I did my research.
Seems like more reason to get a EV for us up here in Minnesota
I’m guessing that EVs get worse mileage in overly hot places, as the AC is on to cool the inside.
Doesn’t this apply to gas vehicles as well? The energy comes from somewhere.
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I’m not sure which type of vehicle’s mileage is affected more by A/C.
AC uses electricity directly, gas to electricity conversion is not as efficient as electricity to electricity.
I’m going to guess gas mileage is affected more by A/C. Just my guess though.
Perhaps. Each system will have to fire up a compressor.
I know how the gas system does it: it releases a clutch on the A/C compressor that is connected via belt to the engine.
In an EV, besides, “Push the A/C button,” I don’t know how (meaning what voltage/wattage is spent turning it on) it’s being turned on. I would hope it is in the least electricity-draining way.
However, a gas system is already wasting gas at stops. With the A/C on, it’s not that much more. An electrical system will have to generate that electricity at stops, when it wouldn’t if the AC were not on.
Anywho, there are some interesting tips on this link:
More importantly, electricity is, for now, much less expensive than gas for operating a car. The car company takes much of that savings when you buy the car, though. (And so do some states, since the car is not generating gas tax income.)
And EVs are certainly more economical for short commutes and short distances.
If you need to drive far, though, keep the gas car for that.
Something I would not want to do: drive to Vegas from SoCal, have to stop in Baker at the EVgo station underneath the giant thermometer for a half-hour and walk to the Alien Fresh Jerky store in 110 heat (so says the thermometer). All because the EV couldn’t make it all the way to Vegas (or even to the border) on one “tank” of juice in Summer. (My current gas car can do it, as have every one of my prior cars.)
Thanks everyone. yea, mostly a to and from work car and running the kids to and from events. i’d like to be able to go see my dad with it, about 80 miles away without having to charge it for the return trip.
I do have a garage that stays above outside temps so i wasn’t as worried about the loss of range in the winter. I basically just need to figure out the charging situation and then i can start diving deeper into what to actually get. Not in a huge hurry, just hoping to replace one car sooner rather than later, as my wife and i have two paid off vehicles but are probably coming towards the end of their lives and would prefer to separate out the purchases to replace.
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Has any EV owner here ever done a long road trip when you had to plan out your station to station charging stops?
How is it to charge up when you are away from home?
A high school friend did this with his husband when they first bought their Tesla. Seattle to Cincinnati with a lot of other stops, returned via a different route.
I think it took a little under an hour to charge it each time, which they timed to correspond with meal / pit stops.
I think the level of inconvenience depends on your preferred mode of eating on the road.
My parents: stop for every meal or snack, get out of the car, walk around a bit, use the bathroom. eat in a sit-down restaurant, walk around some more, use the bathroom again, resume road trip
Me: drive through… use the bathroom when gassing up the car which is the only time you turn the engine off.
If you prefer my parents’ mode of travel and don’t mind a little extra planning then I think the inconvenience would be minor.
If you prefer my mode of travel then your head might explode.
Yeah I just read an article about it I found online.
A problem is that the charging options are limited. You may have to wait in line to charge.
Your best laid plan to charge may turn out not to be reliable. A plan to stay overnight at a hotel in the middle of nowhere that offered overnight charging spots was a great idea. Until, that is, the travelers got there and found other cars already taking up the only available charging spots for the night. So they were basically forced to stay an extra day until the chargers freed up. This is probably not a big issue if your travel is near major interstates. But the trip in the article was about going to national parks in Utah that were off the beaten path.
It would be interesting to see how this varied throughout the country. When we left Philly the guy we sold our house to was from Idaho and seriously thought we were pulling his leg when we told him what we were paying for electric. We’d told him the monthly amount and his question was whether it was semi-annual or annual. Our house was smaller than the place he was leaving in Idaho (since Philly real estate is so much more) and we were paying as much in a month as he was paying in a year.
Also, I’d be hesitant to buy an electric vehicle in parts of CA where they have rolling blackouts. It’d suck if you couldn’t get your car out of the garage.
A couple of things:
I am a little dubious about the estimated electricity that it actually takes to re-juice the batteries. I think that the EV car companies might be stretching that at least as much as they stretch the “miles per charge” estimate. That last estimate seems to be a theoretical achievement that one will never get in real life even under optimal conditions.
Also, what say you about the real environmental impact of EVs when the battery production seems to involve real bad:
Lithium Batteries’ Dirty Secret: Manufacturing Them Leaves Massive Carbon Footprint Lithium Batteries' Dirty Secret: Manufacturing Them Leaves Massive Carbon Footprint | IndustryWeek
https://unctad.org/news/developing-countries-pay-environmental-cost-electric-car-batteries
And what about the impact of shifting the greenhouse gas emissions from ICE gasoline combustion to coal powered electricity production?
Not sure who’s increasing the use of coal in generating electricity. Maybe China.
Coal still generates 20% of US electricity. That has been on the decline in recent years. But I posit that coal powered electricity may increase in the future (or at least decrease at a decreasing rate) because we will need to massively increase electricity production proportionally to the decrease in oil consumption as we switch to electric cars.
A main reason for the decrease in coal powered electricy has been the rise of natural gas based electrical power generation. Why don’t we just switch our vehicles to NG power?
They exist. Similar issue to EVs: need to find the NG stations. These work pretty efficiently as company cars, wherein the company has a NG tank on their site. I think my garbage trucks use NG. The local shuttle system in uses NG.
Best way to go is to get solar panels and charge your EV with the solar power. Win-win.
Win.
Well, you can manually open the garage door…[/r]
My wife is looking into a backup generator, but those have increased in cost, coincidentally [/r], since these rolling blackouts have become a regular occurrence (Summer only). The good ones require a lot of electrical work.
Idaho has the second cheapest electricity rates in the country. Dams?
I had one that I had installed in my last house. It was a comfort to know that I had backup when I had a power outage (which was unfortunately more than once per year)