Cold Climate with short Commute

[SigNC]

I hate when there's no regen. I still think people are discounting the amount of energy regen offers. It's not a negligible amount. Brakes waste an enormous amount of energy.

Agreed but also it's not worth preheating your car for half an hour or whatever just to get regen.

 

[Whisky]

Because I have a very short commute in cold weather it's really worst case, I could spend as much fuel heating the battery as I am charging it if I don't think about it. If it's something simple I can do, like just lower the current, I'd do it.

I also don't like wasting energy if it can be avoided (they do use fossil fuel to make electricity as well as nuclear).

This all makes sense, and the only conclusion for cold-weather driving (in my mind) that makes sense is to charge the car in the morning before you drive, and interrupt the charging as you leave. I don't know if that's one our or two hours or however long your car typically charges, but that's the answer. Here's my logic for this:

- Charging at night means the car expels energy on a cold battery, warms the battery, charges the battery, and then the battery cools down back to ambient levels. You drive the car, the car expels energy warming the battery and also you lose regenerative breaking

If you charge in the morning, your battery is cold, and you'll have similar loss the first moments when charging because the battery is cold. Eventually, your battery will be in a better place, and you'll have regenerative breaking when you step into the car and a warm battery. Your car will drive more efficiently on your way to work.

Will it make a huge difference? I don't know, but it should make a magical difference. Just like having regenerative breaking, it's not a game changer, but it is also helpful.

The other thing I'll add is it's better to leave the car plugged in. Yes, it'll use extra energy, but it will only protect the battery at extreme cold temperatures. Otherwise, whatever energy it pulls out of the socket, is the same energy it would take from the battery (ie, if someone opens the door, and the heating goes on, it's better that energy is more efficiently pulled from the wall directly than having that energy be consumed by the battery, that had a loss of some efficiency while it was being charged).

At any rate, yeah, for short driving the promised savings are not there during colder months. Compared to a very efficient (and very slow!) ICE car, it's better to consider the other benefits of the car which include having a better car for the environment, higher safety rating, more of a luxury car, etc.. etc...

I also found this helpful.. it's for the MS but it gives you an idea on ratios when driving in the cold.